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WHAT JESUS SAID ABOUT HEAVEN 


COKESBURY 
DEVOTIONAL 
SERIES 


The Apostles’ Creed—A Romance in Religion 


Arthur Talmage Abernethy 


\ 


The Sermon on the Mount—An Interpretation 
I. C. Jenkins 


What Jesus Said about Heaven—A Study in 
the Four Gospels 
J.T. Whitley 





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WHAT JESUS SAID | 
ABOUT HEAVEN 


A STUDY IN THE FOUR GOSPELS 


ff BY 
J. T. WHITLEY, D.D. 
Author of ‘‘Filled with Messages from Thee,”’ Etc. 


I AM THE WAY, AND THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE. John 14: 6. 
HEAVEN AND EARTH SHALL PASS AWAY, BUT MY WORDS SHALL 
NOT PASS AWAY. Matthew 24: 35. 


NASHVILLE, TENN. 
COKESBURY PRESS 
1925 





Copyricnt, 1925 
BY 
LaMAR & BARTON 


at 
Printed in the United States of America 


TO 


My Daughters 


MARY ESTHER WHITLEY 
ANNIE WHITLEY PLEASANTS 


AFFECTIONATE, FaITHFUL 
CapPaBLB 


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PREFACE 


HE purpose of this book is to ascertain 
and set forth with at least approximate 
fullness the teachings of Jesus Christ concerning 
Heaven. The teachings of the Apostles and 
other Biblical writers are referred to as inter- 
pretative of the Master’s doctrine; but no at- 
tempt has been made to present all the passages 
in the Epistles and elsewhere, which might have 
been included if the object in view had been to 
show what the Bible as a whole, or the entire 
New Testament, has to say about the future life 
of the saints. 

The author’s method has been to examine the 
four Gospels with great care, collate all the 
passages in which Jesus spoke about Heaven, 
classify them under appropriate heads, and in- 
terpret them in a simple and straightforward 
way, with such help as he found available in the 
writings of wise and godly men who have 
sought to interpret the Master’s teachings. 
Passages containing the phrase, “‘the kingdom 
of heaven,’’ have not been included, since these 
do not relate to the future life so much as to the 
reign of God on earth in the present moral order. 

So far as the author is aware, this exact sub- 
ject has not been treated in book form before. 

(7) 


8 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


While Heaven has been written about in Com- 
mentaries, Bible Dictionaries, and other forms 
of literature, there seems not to have been 
published any monograph, in which an attempt 
has been made to exhibit and interpret all of 
the recorded utterances of Jesus upon this vital 
and engaging subject. It is hoped, therefore, 
that the present discussion, however inadequate, 
may serve to throw at least a few rays of light 
upon matters which intimately concern the 
eternal interests of all mankind. These chapters 
have been written prayerfully with humble 
trust in the Divine Spirit’s help, and the volume 
is now sent forth in the hope that it may, in 
some small measure at least, bring honor to 
the Heavenly Father and his redeeming Son, 
and may shed heavenly radiance upon many a 
pilgrim path. J. T. WHITLEY. 
NORFOLK, VA. 


CONTENTS 


PAGE 
PRE BOR iis Soin 0 6G cere alee ales CHER eet ae 'eIe 7 
CHAPTER I 
The Desire to Know: oie ek laced 6 rere Few es “11 
CHAPTER II 
The Only Qne'Who Knows: i. ..... fi ate ieee. 16 
CHAPTER III 
Dhe' Nature of Heavens ee re a a 24 
CHAPTER IV 
HE Mather in, Pea Vets se ies winch oe muerte alay 30 
CHAPTER V 
EDGE SAViOUL 10 FGA Velie aie sh io eae lee a ale eee 36 
CHAPTER VI | 
lie Aaiwels I RITCA VEE: ei es cicleratuse's AMG a eatecwret aie ws 45 
CHAPTER VII 
The Saints in Heaven: Certainty..............0.. 55 
CHAPTER VIII 
The Saints in Heaven: Dignity... . 0.20.00... cee0 61 
CHAPTER IX 
The Saints in Heaven: Fellowship............... 68 
CHAPTER X 
The Saints in Heaven: Experience............... 76 
CHAPTER XI 
The Saints in Heaven: Occupation............... 83 
CHAPTER XII 
The Saints in Heaven: Preparation............... 92 
CHAPTER XIII 
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CHAPTER I 
THE DESIRE TO KNOW 


OR more than sixty years I have been in- 
terested more or less keenly in the subject 

of Heaven. As a child I heard my Christian 
mother talk about it in reverent tones, and 
listened to her singing of it as she went about 
the household work. In the Sunday school I 
heard and read about the ‘‘Home over there,’’ 
and joined with teachers and scholars in singing 
the familiar song of that day: ‘‘There is a 
happy land, far, far away.’’ Later on, when in 
my sixteenth year I came into a definite and 
joyous religious experience and united with 
the Church, it was a delight to read about 
heaven in the pages of Holy Writ, to think of 
it as the home which was to be mine in the far 
future, to pray to Him whom I conceived to 
have His throne in that beautiful city, and to 
sing the hymns in which devout hearts had 
poured out their aspirations for the ‘‘land of 
pure delight, where saints immortal reign.” 
In still later days, when I had been ordained to 
the sacred ministry of the gospel and had found 
in the pulpit an opportunity of speaking the 
divine message, it was a joy to preach about 
heaven, to depict its glories as I conceived them 

(11) 


12 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


to be, and to invite the sinful and the heavy © 
laden to have their sins cleansed away, and to 
prepare for the ‘‘Home of the soul’”’ that Jesus’ 
had gone to make ready for his disciples. And 
now after many years, no longer privileged to 
speak often from the pulpit because of gathering 
infirmities, I find myself more deeply interested 
in heaven than ever before, because I am ex- 
pecting at no distant day to find out for myself 
by actual experience the many things about 
heaven that I have long wished to know. One 
who is soon to change his residence from a shift- 
ing tent to ‘“‘the city which hath the founda- 
tions,’’ naturally desires to know as much as 
possible about the place to which he is going, 
and something of the details of the life that he 
is to live forever there. 

It is certain that this desire to know all that 
is at present knowable about heaven is shared 
by multitudes of Christians, and to some extent 
by many who are not numbered in the member- 
ship of any Church. Some persons profess to 
believe that there is no heaven in reality, and 
so they feel no interest in reading or hearing 
about it. Others assume an agnostic attitude, 
saying that we can know nothing at all in this 
present life as to any life that may lie beyond. 
But the great mass of men and women who live 
in Christian lands do believe in the reality of 
heaven, even if many are vague in their notions 


The Desire to Know 13 


about it, and many are not shaping their con- 
duct with reference to it. All devout souls 
naturally look forward to the solemnities of their 
passage from this world to that which lies 
beyond, and their aspirations after what they 
conceive to be the joys and glories of heaven 
naturally find expression in prayer and praise. 
In early life it is not so natural for thoughts of 
heaven to be prominent in the mind, though 
sometimes youth does aspire ardently after 
the land of eternal youth. As the years go by 
and thought matures while burdens accumulate, 
one is apt to turn his thoughts more definitely 
toward the life of rest and purity and nobler 
usefulness that lies beyond the grave. And 
when age advances to the period of infirmity, 
and the pleasures of this life dwindle while its 
cares and burdens increase, the child of God 
becomes more and more deeply interested in 
the home which the Master has promised his 
disciples in the Father’s house of many man- 
sions, “‘where the wicked cease from troubling, 
and the weary are at rest.’”’ The soul thus 
burdened, facing the fact that he is approaching 
nigh to the place “‘where we lay our burdens 
down,” is apt to resort to the Holy Scriptures 
for light on the future, and especially to learn 
all that can be known about heaven. In those 
pages he finds that other souls in the long ago 
desired to know about the future life. He finds 


14 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


in the book of Job the question: ‘‘If a man die, 
shall he live again?’ (Job xiv. 14). He reads 
the joyous words of David: “‘Thou wilt show 
me the path of life: in thy presence is fullness of 
joy; in thy right hand there are pleasures for 
evermore”’ (Ps. xvi. 11). And he dwells with 
sympathetic understanding upon the great 
saying of Paul: ‘‘Now we see in a mirror, 
darkly; but then face to face; now I know in 
part; but then shall I know fully even as also 
I was fully known” (1 Cor. xiii. 12). 

Turning from the pages of Scripture to the 
recorded lives of good men and women of later 
times, one finds everywhere a devout and eager 
curiosity concerning the life beyond. Even 
where that curiosity has not found expression 
in biographies it has existed in greater or less 
intensity in accordance with the natural work- 
ings of the human mind. The desire to know 
what lies in the future is inevitable to the 
healthy mind, and the gratification of it is a 
source of deep satisfaction to the devout soul. 
Even where the light is most dim the eager one 
lingers and longs for even the tiniest gleam 
from the other shore of the mystic River. Many 
questions press forward craving to be answered: 
Where is heaven? Is it a place, or merely a 
state? Ifa place, is it located in some distant 
star, or is it to be found here upon a renovated 
earth under the same familiar heavens? Shall 


The Desire to Know 15 


the happy soul that wins heaven be privileged to 
behold the Infinite Father Himself, or will the 
Incarnate Son forever represent the invisible 
Father to the sons and daughters whom he has 
brought to glory? In what form will the Christ 
be manifested to the saints in glory? Will 
friends be brought together in heaven, and will 
they recognize each other? Will families be 
permitted to live in a fellowship as close and 
intimate as that which marked their earthly 
life? Will the little children who died here be 
found there still in their immaturity, or will 
they have developed into full-grown men and 
women whose lives have never been marred 
and stained by sin? What will be the occupa- 
tions of the dwellers in heaven? Is rest the chief 
feature, or is worship still more prominent, or 
is holy service in behalf of others the chief 
thing that will occupy the happy ones who have 
inherited the great salvation? What are to be 
the relations between the redeemed saints and 
the angels who never fell from their original 
innocency? Will there be eternal progress in 
character and felicity in heaven? Such ques- 
tions, and perhaps many others, arise from time 
to time in the minds and hearts of those who 
are looking forward to a home in the City of 
God. Is there any way to know even a little 
about heaven? Let us look and see. 


CHAPTER II 
THE ONLY ONE WHO KNOWS 


HEN we begin to ask questions about 
Heaven it is natural to look around for 
sources of information. If any living person 
can give the answers, it is important to find 
him and learn what he knows. If any person or 
persons of any past age knew the hidden things 
of the life beyond, and if records of their know- 
ledge have come down to us, it is important 
that we find and study those records. If a 
Hand from above has drawn aside the veil and 
offered us even a glimpse of the Home of the 
blest, it is a great privilege and a solemn duty 
to make use of such an opportunity. Such 
knowledge is to be coveted above all lore that 
men are used to esteem. 

In reading the accounts that we have of men 
and nations other than those which are promi- 
nent in the Bible, we find very little, if any, light 
upon the problem before us. There seems to 
have been among the ancients, even back to the 
very dawn of history, some notion of a life 
beyond the present, in which there are rewards 
for those whom the divinities approve, as well 
as retributions for those who have incurred the 
displeasure of the supernatural powers. But 

(16) 


The Only One Who Knows 17 


there is no evidence that even the wisest 
philosopher of the heathen world ever caught 
a glimpse of a destiny which might be regarded 
as comparable to the Heaven of our modern 
thought. In fact, most of the sages were doubt- 
ful upon the question of individual immortality, 
not being able to affirm with any degree of con- 
fidence that the soul of man survives the dis- 
solution of the ties that bind it to the body. 
Our questions about Heaven find no certain 
answer there. 

A similar result follows our application to the 
modern cults that claim to hold communication 
with the disembodied spirits that have passed 
on before. All attempts to ascertain something 
definite about the departed and the conditions 
that surround them, well meant as they may 
be conceded to be, are so beclouded by so-called 

‘‘mediums’”’ and by unauthorized inferences 
from obscure phenomena, that no reliance can 
be placed upon them in seeking light upon the 
reality and conditions of Heaven. 

When one is convinced that light cannot be 
had from the quarters just mentioned, it is 
natural and wise to turn to the one Book that 
claims to have definite information concerning 
the things that lie beyond the veil. But in 
searching that great group of writings, number- 
ing thirty-nine separate documents, which we 


know as the Old Testament, one finds to his 
7 ¢ 


18 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


disappointment a much less brilliant light upon 
the problems of the future than he had hoped 
to receive. Not that the Old Testament is 
entirely silent upon the subject of the future life, 
with its rewards for the good and its penalties 
for the doers of evil. It is unnecessary to quote 
passages here to prove this assertion. But it 
remains true that the books of the Old Testa- 
ment give us no definite knowledge of Heaven 
as we understand the term. The Hebrew con- 
ception of the state of the dead was that of a 
region called Sheol, synonymous with the New 
Testament word Hades, a place of shadows and 
ghostly beings, some of whom indeed were 
understood to be better off than when on earth, 
but far from that keen intelligence and abound- 
ing life and joy that we are accustomed to 
associate with the notion of heaven. It has 
been often and truly said that the rewards of 
righteousness in the Old Testament are chiefly 
material and temporary, while the prospect of 
felicity beyond the grave is comparatively held 
in the background. No doubt, men like David, 
Isaiah, and Jeremiah fed their souls upon the 
hope of a blessed immortality; but the writings 
that have come down to our day do not answer 
with any degree of definiteness the questions 
that we are constantly asking about heaven. 
Turning to the New Testament is like passing 
out of the dim starlight, or at most out of moon- 


The Only One Who Knows 19 


light, into the radiance of the rising sun. Here 
we begin to find answers to at least some of our 
anxious questions. There is more light beaming 
forth from the twenty-seven booklets that we 
call the New Testament than was ever shed by 
all the literature of the wisest nations of the 
world, combined with the utterances of all the 
prophets and psalmists, historians and sages, 
recorded in the pages of the Hebrew Scriptures. 
More than this may be said. There is clearer 
light on the subject of Heaven in the Gospel 
according to John, than in all the secular litera- 
ture of the world, plus all the utterances of the 
Old Testament Scriptures. 

Reserving the four Gospels for consideration 
further on, let us question the writers of the 
Acts, the Epistles, and the Revelation of John 
as to what testimony they present concerning 
heaven. There is no space here to record that 
testimony at length, even if it were not foreign 
to the present discussion. It must suffice to 
say that Paul, Peter, and the other New Testa- 
ment writers not only take for granted the 
reality of heaven, but in various places affirm 
their belief in such a destiny for the saints in 
explicit terms, and depict in such colors as they 
can command the joys and glories of that better 
life. Peter tells his brethren of the ‘‘inheritance 
incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth 
not away, reserved in heaven for you”’ (1 Pet. i. 


20 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


4). Paul tells of his being caught up into ‘‘the 
third heaven,’’ where he ‘‘heard unspeakable 
words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter”’ 
(2 Cor. xii. 2-4). And the writer of the Revela- 
tion thus vividly describes the joys of the 
heavenly inhabitants: ‘‘They shall hunger no 
more, neither thirst any more; neither shall the 
sun strike upon them, nor any heat: for the 
Lamb that is in the midst of the throne shall 
be their shepherd, and shall guide them unto 
fountains of waters of life: and God shall wipe 
away every tear from their eyes”’ (Rev. vii. 16, 
17). Itissafe to say that heaven is a conception 
that runs like a bright stream of soul refresh- 
ment through all the writings of the Apostles 
and those associated with them in producing 
the New Testament literature, and that the 
goal of all their teaching is found in a holy and 
blessed home for godly men and women and 
innocent little children beyond this present life. 
In this chapter, however, it is not purposed to 
do more than mention this apostolic testimony, 
reserving further reference to their teachings 
to be used as interpretations of, and side lights 
upon, the testimony of Him whose word is 
supreme over all. 

The only One who knew and still knows at 
first-hand all about Heaven, and who can 
answer, if he will, all our inquiries about it, is 
the Only-Begotten Son of the Father, Jesus of 


The Only One Who Knows 21 


Nazareth, God manifest in the flesh. What the 
prophets and psalmists dimly glimpsed, and 
the apostolic writers more clearly understood, 
was secondhand information at best. What 
Jesus said about heaven was based on absolute 
knowledge. This is evident from the fact that 
his original home was in heaven. He said over 
and over again that he existed before his in- 
carnation, that he descended out of heaven, 
that the Father sent him into the world to do 
his will, that he was about to leave the world 
and go unto the Father, to share the glory that 
he had with the Father before the creation of 
the world. Hear his very words: ‘‘ Before 
Abraham was born, I am” (John viii. 58). 
“Father, glorify thou me with thine own self 
with the glory which I had with thee before 
the world was’ (John xvii. 5). ‘No one 
hath ascended into heaven, but he that 
descended out of heaven, even the Son of 
man, who is in heaven”’ (John ii. 13). ‘I am 
come down from heaven, not to do mine own 
will, but the will of him that sent me”’ (John vi. 
38). ‘“‘I am the living bread which came down 
out of heaven’”’ (John vi. 51). ‘I came forth 
and am come from God; for neither have I come 
of myself, but he sent me’’ (John vili. 42). 
‘“As thou didst send me into the world, even so 
sent I them [the disciples] into the world”’ 
(John xvii. 18). 


22% What Jesus Said about Heaven 


Not only had Christ existed with the Father 
originally, and had been sent into the world by — 
the Father, but he was going back to the Father ° 
at the completion of his earthly mission. He 
said to the disciples at a critical time in their 
experience: ‘‘ What then if ye should behold the 
Son of man ascending where he was before?”’ 
(John vi. 62). ‘‘Yet.a little while am I with 
you, and I go unto him that sent me”’ (John vii. 
33). “I came out from the Father, and am 
come into the world: again, I leave the world, 
and go unto the Father’’ (John xvi: 28). After 
his resurrection he said to Mary Magdalene: 
*‘Go unto my brethren, and say to them, I 
ascend unto my Father and your Father, and 
my God and your God” (John xx. 17). Tothe 
penitent robber on the cross beside him he gave 
the pledge: “‘ Verily I say unto thee, To-day shalt 
thou be with me in Paradise ’’ (Luke xxiii.43). 

In this connection it is worth while to call 
attention to that remarkable expression found 
in John iii. 13, already quoted: ‘‘No one hath 
ascended into heaven, but he that descended 
out of heaven, even the Son of man, who is in 
heaven.’ 1 am aware that the last clause of this 
verse is not found in some of the manuscripts, 
and is omitted in some of the critical editions 
of the New Testament text. But still the under- 
lying thought is entirely harmonious with what 
we know of the self-consciousness of Jesus, 


The Only One Who Knows 23 


which one writer fitly expresses by the remark 
that ‘‘Christ’s proper abode and home were in 
‘heaven,’’ and that ‘‘he maintained a vital and 
continuous communion therewith, dwelling in 
the Spirit in heaven, even while in the flesh upon 
earth.”’ In a very real sense it was true that 
Jesus was in heaven while yet he trod the hills 
and vales of Judea and Galilee. 

We reach the conclusion, therefore, in our 
quest for knowledge about heaven, that no one 
but Jesus Christ had first-hand information, 
and that he did possess while on earth full 
knowledge of those ‘‘heavenly things’’ which 
he withheld from Nicodemus, because that 
*“‘teacher of Israel’’ was incapable of receiving 
them. This fullness of knowledge Jesus pos- 
sessed and was able to impart to discerning men, 
in virtue of the fact that he declared concerning 
himself: that he lived in heaven before the in- 
carnation, that he came down from heaven at 
the bidding of his Father, that he was in com- 
munion with heaven while still upon earth, 
and that he was going to return to heaven at 
the close of his earthly mission, to share in the 
glory that he had with the Father before the 
foundation of the world. Relying upon the 
soundness of these conclusions, and believing 
that Jesus knew all about heaven, let us examine 
his words as recorded by the Evangelists and 
reverently gather the information they contain. 


CHAPTER III 
THE NATURE OF HEAVEN 


NE of the age-long questions that men 
have asked concerning Heaven is, whether 

it is a place, or merely a state, or whether it is 
both a place and a state of being. Consulting 
the utterances of the only One who knows, we 
hear Jesus saying to his disciples in that 
memorable talk in the upper room on the even- 
ing before his death: ‘‘Let not your heart be 
troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. 
In my Father’s house are many mansions; if 
it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to 
prepare a place for you. And if I goand prepare 
a place for you, I come again, and will receive 
you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may 
be also’”’ (John xiv. 1-3). This is the clearest 
and most definite statement recorded in the 
Gospels, wherein Jesus throws light upon the 
question under consideration. He calls the 
future home of his faithful disciples ‘‘a place,”’ 
and further describes it as ‘‘my Father’s house,”’ 
declaring that in that ‘‘house”’ are ‘‘many 
mansions,’ or dwelling places. The word 
translated ‘‘place’’ is the standard term used in 
the New Testament to denote “any portion of 
space marked off, as it were, from surrounding 

(24) . 


The Nature of Heaven 25 


space.” (See article ‘‘topos’’ in Thayer’s Greek- 
English Lexicon of the New Testament.)! The 
word rendered ‘‘house’’ means primarily ‘‘an 
inhabited edifice, a dwelling,’’ and is used in 
that sense uniformly by the New Testament 
writers. (See article ‘‘ozkza’’ in Thayer’s 
Lexicon.) In harmony with these terms de- 
noting place is the utterance of Jesus as recorded 
in Matthew v. 34: ‘‘Swear not... by heaven, for 
it is the throne of God.’’ If there is a throne, 
it is fair to infer that there must be space for 
it to occupy, and this means that heaven is a 
place. The word translated ‘‘mansions’’ ap- 
pears to confirm this view. The Greek word 
““monat”’ in John xiv. 2 means dwellings, 
places of abode, and of these Jesus says there 
are many in his Father’s house. Note also that 
he uses the adverb ‘‘where”’ in speaking of the 
future home of his disciples: ‘If any man serve 
me, let him follow me; and where I am, there 
shall also my servant be’’ (John xii. 26). 
‘‘Where”’ and “‘there’’ in their literal sense 
imply location or place. Futhermore in the 
Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus, one of the 
most solemn utterances that ever fell from the 
lips of Jesus, he represents the beggar as being 
carried by the angels into Abraham’s bosom, 
which is a figurative way of saying that Lazarus 
went to heaven. Is not this an intimation that 


1tarper & Brothers, publishers, New York. 


26 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


space is a characteristic of the future home of 
the saints? 

If the plan of this treatise included a discus- 
sion of the testimony of the Apostles and other 
New Testament writers, many passages might 
be quoted to show the harmony of their utter- 
ances with the words of their Divine Master. 
But we are concerned chiefly with what Christ 
himself taught. It may be said in general, how- 
ever, that outside the utterances of the Master, 
as recorded in the four Gospels, we have no 
new and definite light in the New Testament con- 
cerning the question as to whether heaven is a 
place, or a state, or both. Where the Apostles 
speak at all they simply echo the words and 
thoughts of Him who “spake as never man 
spake.” 

It may not be without interest and a certain 
degree of value, however, to quote in exposition 
of the words of Jesus a few opinions which wise 
and devout men have expressed on this subject. 
Dr. Augustus H. Strong, an eminent theologian, 
uses this language: ‘‘Is heaven a place, as well 
as a state? We answer that this is probable, 
for the reason that the presence of Christ’s 
human body is essential to heaven, and 
that this body must be confined to place. 
Since deity and humanity are _ indissolubly 
united in Christ’s single person, we cannot 
regard Christ’s human soul as limited to place 


The Nature of Heaven 27 


without vacating his person of its divinity. 
But we cannot conceive of his human body as 
thus omnipresent. As the new bodies of the 
saints are confined to place, so, it would seem, 
must be the body of their Lord. But, though 
heaven be the place where Christ manifests his 
glory through the human body which he as- 
sumed in the incarnation, our ruling conception 
of heaven must be something higher even than 
this—namely, that of a state of holy com- 
munion with God. Although heaven is prob- 
ably a place, we are by no means to allow this 
conception to become the preponderant one 
in our minds. ... Heaven and hell are es- 
sentially conditions, corresponding to character, 
conditions in which the body and the surround- 
ings of the soul express and reflect its inward 
state. The main thing to be insisted on is there- 
fore the state; place is merely incidental. The 
fact that Christ ascended to heaven with a 
human body, and that the saints are to possess 
glorified bodies, would seem to imply that 
heaven is a place.’ 

To similar purpose is the opinion expressed 
by the great Swiss theologian, F. L. Godet: 
‘“This heavenly dwelling is above all the emblem 
of a spiritual state: that of communion with 


2‘‘Systematic Theology,” by Augustus Hopkins 
Strong, D.D., LL.D.; American Baptist Publication 
Society, publishers, Philadelphia. 


28 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


the Father, the filial position which is accorded 
to Christ in the divine glory, and in which he 
will give believers a share. But this state will 
be realized in a definite place, the place where 
God most illustriously manifests his presence 
and his glory—heaven.’ Dr. Marcus Dods 
makes this comment: ‘‘‘My Father’s house’ is 
used here [in John xiv. 2] of the immediate 
presence of the Father and of that condition 
in which his love and protection are uninter- 
ruptedly and directly experienced. ‘This is most 
naturally thought of as a place, but with the 
corrective that ‘it is not in heaven one finds 
God, but in God one finds heaven.’’’4 Let one 
more quotation suffice, from the Dictionary of 
Religious Knowledge, by Abbott and Conant:® 
“Is heaven a place, or a state? Both a place 
and a state—a place infinitely more beautiful 
than any eye hath ever seen—a state infinitely 
more blessed than any heart hath ever con- 
ceived.’ 

These opinions of wise and devout men are 
offered, not as having authority, but merely as 
interpretative of the Master’s words, and like 
all interpretation should be taken for only what 
they are worth. I see no reason, however, for 

’Godet’s Commentary on John, Funk & Wagnalls, 
publishers, New York. 

4Expositor’s Greek Testament, George H. Doran 


Company, publishers, New York. 
6’ Harper & Brothers, publishers, New York. 


The Nature of Heaven 29 


dissenting from the view that what the Scrip- 
tures call ‘‘heaven’’ combines the characteristics 
of both a state anda place. Yet, while the idea 
of state, or condition, seems to call for no special 
comment just here, it should be said that we 
cannot definitely know what is included in the 
Scriptural use of “place’’ as applied to the 
future abode of the saints. How far spatial 
relations may be predicated of the world to 
come, must remain an insoluble problem while 
our present limitations remain. 

If heaven is a place, where is it? Some have 
conjectured the great star Sirius, while others 
think that this earth, renovated and refitted, 
will be the future abode of the saints. All such 
speculations are vain. A veil of impenetrable 
mystery conceals the location of heaven, and 
with this we must be content. 


CHAPTER IV 
THE FATHER IN HEAVEN 


JF Jesus said but little about Heaven as a 

place, leaving the question of locality un- 
certain, as of but little importance, not so has 
he left us in doubt as to who are the inhabitants 
of the House of Many Mansions. First of all, 
he said over and over again that Heaven is the 
Home of the Father—his Father and ours. It 
is interesting to note that the first recorded 
utterance of Jesus, when he was twelve years 
old, reveals his consciousness of the Fatherhood 
of God. To his mother, in reply to her chiding 
question as to why he had detached himself 
from their company when they started home- 
ward from Jerusalem, he said: ‘‘ How is it that 
ye sought me? knew ye not that I must be in 
my Father’s house?’ Nearly a score of years 
later, when he uttered those revolutionary 
sayings that are commonly called the Sermon 
on the Mount, he used the expression ‘‘ your 
Father who is in heaven,” or its equivalent, no 
less than twenty-nine times. In this filial rela- 
tion toward his Father he associates himself 
with his disciples, as may be seen in the message 
which he sent to his brethren by Mary Magda- 
lene on the morning of his resurrection: ‘‘Go 

(30) 


The Father in Heaven 31 


unto my brethren, and say to them, I ascend 
unto my Father and your Father, and my God 
and your God”’ (John xx. 17). 

There is a wealth of meaning in the way in 
which Jesus associates Heaven with the Father- 
hood of God. The literature of the world, aside 
from the New Testament and writings based 
upon it, knows little if anything of the paternal 
relation of the Infinite One to mankind. Even 
the Old Testament saints appear to have had 
but a dim idea of such a relation. To them he 
was Creator, King, Lawgiver, Judge, Deliverer, 
but rarely ever realized as Father. At least 
that is the impression conveyed by the utter- 
ances of psalmists and prophets, the most 
spiritual men of the ages before the advent of 
the Son, who alone reveals the Father in his 
fullness to men. Jesus also knew perfectly that 
God is Sovereign over the universe, as he voiced 
the truth on a memorable occasion: ‘I thank 
thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that 
thou didst hide these things from the wise and 
understanding, and didst reveal them unto 
babes”’ (Matt. xi. 25). But the favorite word 
of Jesus when talking with God or telling others 
about him was “Father,” as the Gospels 
abundantly show. In prayer he appeals to the 
Hearer of prayer as “Father,” or as ‘‘Holy 
Father,” or ‘‘Righteous Father,’’ as recorded 
in the prayer before the cross (John xvii. 11-25). 


32 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


And in his intimate conversations with the 
disciples, as well as in his more public teaching 
when crowds hung upon his words, every al-— 
lusion to God is made in the words ‘‘the Fa- 
ther,’ or ‘‘my Father,” or “your Father.” 
Accordingly, when he speaks of heaven he calls 
it ‘‘my Father’s house,” thus associating the 
future home of the redeemed soul with the 
presence and blessing of the Supreme Father, 
‘from whom every fatherhood in heaven and 
on earth is named”’ (Eph. iii. 15). In harmony 
with this utterance is the explicit declaration 
of Jesus to his disciples: ‘‘One is your Father, 
even he who is in heaven”’ (Matt. xxiii. 9). 
Jesus represents the Father in heaven as be- 
holding His human children even in their 
closest retirement, with ears open to their pray- 
ers and hands full of blessings to bestow upon 
them. He said: ‘‘When thou prayest, enter into 
thine inner chamber, and having shut thy door, 
pray to thy Father who is in secret, and thy 
Father who seeth in secret shall recompense 
thee’? (Matt. vi. 6). ‘Your Father knoweth 
what things ye have need of before ye ask him. 
After this manner therefore pray ye; Our Fa- 
ther, who art in heaven, Hallowed be thy 
name.’ Then follow expressions of ardent 
desire that the Father’s kingdom may come, 
and the Father’s will may be done on earth as 
it is done in heaven. Last come humble peti- 


The Father in Heaven 33 


tions for daily bread, forgiveness of debts, and 
protection from the temptations of the Evil 
One. It is heartening to remember that this 
prayer of God’s children is addressed to Him 
who is not merely Maker and Ruler, but in a 
special sense the Father of those who are voicing 
their aspirations and needs. And that Father 
is ‘in heaven,’ far removed from all the 
limitations of earthly parentage. Even human 
parents, in spite of their ‘‘being evil’’ and 
limited by many hampering conditions, know 
how to give good gifts to their children; how 
much more then, says Jesus, will your Father 
in heaven, who is free from alli evil and un- 
hampered by circumstances, give good things 
to them that ask Him (Matt. vii. 11). He 
sheds forth the Holy Spirit from the fountain 
of his Fatherhood, and he gives not only bread 
for the body, but ‘“‘the true bread out of 
heaven,’’ which means his only-begotten Son, 
who gave his body for the life of the world 
(John vi. 32-51). 

From the stores of his boundless wisdom the 
Father in heaven reveals to his human children 
all that they need to know in this world con- 
cerning his Son and the redeeming work that 
he came to accomplish. When Jesus asked his 
disciples, ““Who say ye that I am?” and Simon 
Peter answered, ‘‘ Thou art the Christ, the Son 


of the living God,” the Master said to him: 
3 


34 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


‘Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jonah; for flesh 
and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but 
my Father who is in heaven’’ (Matt. xvi. 15- 
17). In harmony with this are the words of 
Jesus to the disciples, conveying the assurance 
that the Holy Spirit, the promised Helper, 
*‘shall guide you into all the truth” (John xvi. 
13). 

The Father in heaven is one who delights to 
forgive sins; but he requires that men shall 
repent and forsake their sins in order to for- 
giveness. Moreover, he will not accept any 
man’s repentance as sincere and adequate 
until he has forgiven those who have sinned 
against him. Jesus emphasizes this requirement 
in the words that immediately follow the Lord’s 
Prayer: ‘‘But if ye forgive not men their tres- 
passes, neither will your Father forgive your 
trespasses’’ (Matt. vi. 15). But when these 
conditions are met, the Father’s heart sheds 
forth its balm of pardon from the heavenly 
home into the waiting heart of his penitent and 
forgiving child. Akin to this are the words of 
Jesus giving his disciples commandment to love 
their enemies and to pray for their persecutors, 
with the assurance that they shall thus become 
“‘the sons of your Father who is in heaven; for 
he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and the 
good, and sendeth rain on the just and the un- 
just”? (Matt. v. 44, 45). In doing such things 


The Father in Heaven 35 


he declares that his disciples become, in imita- 
tion of himself, ‘‘the light of the world,’ and 
his charge to all who would be sons and heirs of 
the Heavenly Parenthood is this: ‘‘Let your 
light so shine before men, that they may see 
your good works, and glorify your Father who 
is in heaven’’ (Matt. v. 16). 


CHAPTER V 
THE SAVIOUR IN HEAVEN 


ESUS said that Heaven is the Home, not of 

the Father only, but also of himself, the 
Divine Saviour of men. To the hostile Jews 
who hung about him with their evil designs, 
he declared on a memorable occasion: ‘‘ Before 
Abraham was born, I am”’ (John viii. 58). In 
the prayer that he offered in the presence of 
his disciples on the evening before his death, 
he prayed: “Father, glorify thou me with thine 
own self with the glory which I had with thee 
before the world was”’ (John xvii. 5). To some 
of his disciples who were murmuring their 
dissent at some things he had just spoken, he 
put the question: ‘‘What then if ye should be- 
hold the Son of man ascending where he was 
before?”’ (John vi. 62). In these passages he 
distinctly asserts his preéxistence in a sphere 
where he shared the glory of the Father before 
the world was created. In another passage he 
affirms that the Father loved him before crea- 
tion: ‘‘Thou lovedst me before the foundation 
of the world”’ (John xvii. 24). In harmony with 
these words of Jesus is the declaration of the 
Apostle John in the Prologue to his Gospel: ‘‘In 
the beginning was the Word, and the Word was 

(36) ‘ 


The Saviour in Heaven 37 


with God, and the Word was God. The same 
was in the beginning with God’’ (John i. 1, 2). 
And the Apostle Paul wrote of ‘Christ Jesus, 
who, existing in the form of God, counted not 
the being on an equality with God a thing to be 
grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form 
of aservant’’ (Phil. ii. 5-7). In the face of these 
explicit statements there is no room for doubt 
concerning the teaching that the original home 
of the Son was in Heaven with the Infinite 
Father. 

Jesus affirmed also, over and over again, that 
he left his home in heaven for a time, to dwell 
among men in order to execute his Father’s 
gracious purpose of salvation. He speaks of 
himself as ‘‘He that descended out of heaven”’ 
(John iii. 13), ‘‘Him whom the Father conse- 
crated and sent into the world’’ (John x. 36). 
He declared: ‘‘I am from above;... Iam not of 
this world’’ (John viii. 23); ‘‘I am come down 
from heaven”’ (John vi. 38); ‘‘I am the living 
bread which came down out of heaven’”’ (John 
vi. 51); ‘I came forth and am come from God”’ 
(John viii. 42); ‘‘I came out from the Father, 
and am come into the world”’ (John xvi. 28). 
And in his prayer before the cross, he said to 
the Father: ‘‘As thou didst send me into the 
world, even so sent J them into the world” 
(John xvii. 18). If language means anything, 
and if the veracity of the Holy Nazarene is 


38 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


beyond all question, not only his preéxistence, 
but his coming to earth and taking human 
nature upon him in the incarnation, is a glorious 
fact surcharged with hope and help for human- 
ity. 

Certain words of Jesus, along with other 
considerations, appear to warrant the statement 
that while he dwelt on earth he was also ina 
real sense a dweller in heaven. Not in heaven 
as a place, for place implies bodily presence; 
but in heaven asa state, this affirmation is made. 
One passage may here be cited: ‘‘No one hath 
ascended into heaven, but he that descended 
out of heaven, even the Son of man, who is in 
heaven’ (John iii. 13). Jesus said this to 
Nicodemus in that noted interview by night in 
Jerusalem. As previously stated, I am aware 
that the words, ‘‘even the Son of man, who is in 
heaven,’ are not found in some of the oldest 
manuscripts, though included in some ancient 
authorities. It is possible that they were in- 
serted later by some copyist, though some 
eminent scholars think they are the very words 
of Jesus. On the whole, the comment of Lyman 
Abbott commends itself: “‘The expression 
‘which is in heaven’ indicates not merely that 
Christ’s proper abode and home were in heaven, 
but also that he maintained a vital and con- 
tinuous communion therewith, dwelling in the 
Spirit in heaven, even while in the flesh upon 


The Saviour in Heaven 39 


earth. The Christian’s experience interprets, 
though it does not fully measure, this mystery 
of the heavenly life in the flesh’’ (Com. on John).! 
Marcus Dods gives it as his opinion that these 
words ‘‘affirm that although he had come out 
of heaven he was still in it, and they show that 
a condition of being, not a locality, was meant 
by heaven’? (Com. on John in Expositor’s 
Greek Testament).2 The great exegete Godet 
says in his comment on this verse: “‘The Lord 
(Jesus) led two lives parallel to each other, an 
earthly life and a heavenly life. He lived in his 
Father, and, while living thus with the Father, 
he gave himself unceasingly to men in his human 
life. The teaching in parables, in which the 
heavenly things take on his lips an earthly dress, 
is the true language answering to that existence 
which is formed of two simultaneous lives, the 
one penetrating the other’’ (Com. on John).’ 
The view here expressed harmonizes with what 
we know of the consciousness of Jesus, revealed 
in his intimate prayers to the Father, and also 
in many of his teachings to his disciples. His 
frequent and protracted seasons of private com- 
munion with God, his familiar intercourse with 
the heavenly world in the Transfiguration 


‘From Dr. Abbott’s SHR ey on John, copyright 
by A. S. Barnes & Company, publishers, New York. 


*George H. Doran Company, publishers, New York. 
’Funk & Wagnalls, publishers, New York. 


40 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


scene, his joyous habit of mind in the midst of 
all the provocations of his strenuous ministry, 
his majestic calmness in the presence of the _ 
Sanhedrin and the Roman governor when on 
trial for his life, are some of the evidences that 
justify the belief, that, while yet on earth in 
the body, he was a resident of heaven in the 
Spirit. 

After his brief but far-reaching earthly minis- 
try, Jesus went back to his home in heaven. 
This he foretold in various terms on several 
occasions. When the hostile Pharisees sent 
officers to arrest him, he said: ‘‘Yet a little 
while I am with you, and I go unto him that 
sent me’’ (John vii. 33). In similar vein he 
told his disciples on the evening before his death: 
‘‘I leave the world, and go unto the Father’”’ 
(John xvi. 28). The purpose of his going away 
he announced to them in the same familiar 
talk: ‘I go to prepare a place for you”’ (John 
xiv. 2). In the prayer that followed this com- 
munication he said to the Father: ‘‘ Now I come 
to thee’? (John xvii. 13). On the morning of 
his resurrection he said to Mary Magdalene, 
who had been weeping at the open sepulcher, 
but was now rejoicing to find her Lord again: 
“Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended unto 
the Father; but go unto my brethren, and say 
to them, I ascend unto my Father and your 
Father, and my God and your God”’ (John xx. 


The Saviour in Heaven 41 


17). In the evening of the same day as in 
disguise he was talking with Cleopas and 
another disciple who were walking sorrowfully 
toward the village of Emmaus: ‘‘ Behooved it 
not the Christ to suffer these things, and to 
enter into his glory?’’ (Luke xxiv. 26). Add to 
these declarations of his purpose the assurance 
that he gave the penitent robber who suffered 
crucifixion by his side: ‘‘ Verily I say unto thee, 
To-day shalt thou be with me in Paradise”’ 
(Luke xxiii. 43). The passages quoted above 
clearly reveal the consciousness of Jesus, and 
show that he knew his home to be in heaven 
with the Father. Shortly after saying these 
things he vanished from the scenes of his 
earthly ministry. The Evangelists who wrote 
the story of his life recorded their explanation 
of his departure from earth in these words: ‘‘As 
they [the disciples] were looking, he was taken 
up; and a cloud received him out of their sight”’ 
(Acts i. 9). ‘‘He led them out until they were 
over against Bethany; and he lifted up his hands, 
and blessed them. And it came to pass, while 
he blessed them, he parted from them, and was 
carried up into heaven’’ (Luke xxiv. 50, 51). 
‘So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken 
unto them, was received up into heaven, and 
sat down at the right hand of God”’ (Mark xvi. 
19). This is the only rational explanation of 


42 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


his disappearance from among men, and upon 
the truth of it we may confidently rely. 

While Heaven is the permanent home of the 
Saviour, he foretold on various occasions a 
return to earth, which is usually spoken of as 
the Second Coming of Christ. A few days 
before his transfiguration he said to the dis- 
ciples: ‘‘The Son of man shall come in the glory 
of his Father with his angels; and then shall he 
render unto every man according to his deeds”’ 
(Matt. xvi. 27). At his so-called trial by the 
Sanhedrin, when the high priest put Jesus on 
oath and said, ‘‘I adjure thee by the living God, 
that thou tell us whether thou art the Christ, the 
Son of God,”’ the prisoner calmly replied in the 
affirmative and solemnly added: ‘I say unto 
you, Henceforth ye shall see the Son of man 
sitting at the right hand of Power, and coming 
on the clouds of heaven”’ (Matt. xxvi. 63, 64). 
To his own disciples he had given the gracious 
assurance only a few hours before the trial: 
‘If I go and prepare a place for you, I come 
again, and will receive you unto myself; that 
where I am, there ye may be also’’ (John xiv. 
3). Upon another occasion he called unto him 
the multitude with his disciples, spoke to them 
of the necessity of self-denial, and added these 
words of warning: ‘‘ Whosoever shall be ashamed 
of me and of my words in this adulterous and 
sinful generation, the Son of man also shall be 


The Saviour in Heaven 43 


ashamed of him, when he cometh in the glory 
of his Father with the holy angels’’ (Mark viii. 
38). In this connection should be read and 
pondered the description of the Final Judgment 
as recorded by Matthew (xxv. 31-46), in which 
Jesus reaffirms his purpose to come again from 
heaven to earth, and sets forth the purpose and 
results of his coming. 

If the scope of this book included an exposi- 
tion of the teachings of Paul and the writers 
of the other Epistles upon the subject under 
consideration, much more might be said con- 
cerning the relationship of Christ to heaven. 
But it is here intended to set forth only what 
Jesus said about heaven, leaving the reader to 
make his own investigation into the teachings 
of the inspired men who wrote the Acts, the 
Epistles, and the Revelation. The field is an 
inviting one, and will repay careful exploration. 
Suffice it here to say, by way of summing up, 
that Jesus affirmed his own preéxistence with 
the Father, his coming down from heaven as 
the Father’s representative, his spiritual resi- 
dence in heaven while on earth in the body, his 
return to the Father after his earthly mission 
was completed, and his purpose to come again 
from Heaven, to judge the righteous and receive 
them to himself, and to judge the wicked and 
dismiss them to the place of retribution for 
which alone they are prepared. Good and wise 


44. What Jesus Said about Heaven 


men have differed in the details of their inter- 
pretation of these recorded words of Christ; 
but we may safely feel that we have in sub- 
stance, if not in every minute detail, what the 
Master said about heaven as his own eternal 
home. 


CHAPTER VI 
THE ANGELS IN HEAVEN 


N the four Gospels Jesus is nowhere repre- 
sented as affirming directly the existence of 

angels and their residence in heaven, but in 
many of his recorded sayings there is recogni- 
tion of these facts as familiar in the thought of 
those to whom he spoke. The Old Testament 
Scriptures had familiarized the people of his day 
with the thought of angels as superior beings 
employed in the service of God for the execution 
of his purposes among men. Accordingly the 
existence and heavenly residence of angels are 
taken for granted, not only in the Gospels, but 
throughout the New Testament writings. 

As to the moral character of angels, the 
Saviour calls them ‘‘holy,”’ as both Mark and 
Luke record in almost identical words: ‘‘ Whoso- 
ever shall be ashamed of me and of my words, 
of him shall the Son of man be ashamed, when 
he cometh in his own glory, and the glory of 
the Father, and of the holy angels’’ (Mark viii. 
38; Luke ix. 26). They are holy, not because 
they never had any opportunity of doing wrong, 
but because, unlike man, they stood the test of 
probation, chose to obey God rather than yield 


to temptation, and thus had their original in- 
(45) 


46 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


nocence transformed into holiness. As holy 
beings they are associates and ministers of the 
holy God. 

That the angels yield prompt and glad 
obedience to the will of their Maker is implied 
in the Lord’s Prayer: ‘‘Thy will be done, as in 
heaven, so on earth’”’ (Matt. vi. 10). Jesus 
here implies that the inhabitants of heaven, 
which of course include the angels, do the Fa- 
ther’s will, and that they do it with such fidelity 
and completeness as to make them fit examples 
of conduct for men who dwell upon earth. If 
an ancient psalmist could say: ‘‘I delight to do 
thy will, O my God; yea, thy law is within my 
heart’’ (Ps. xl. 8), even more joyously can the 
unfallen angels around the throne affirm in song 
and in deeds their perfect loyalty to the will of 
their God and King. 

Jesus in various utterances, as recorded by 
the Evangelists, affirms that the angels are 
subject to him. They were and still are what 
the writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews calls 
‘‘ministering spirits,’ as various passages will 
show. At the very beginning of his ministry 
Jesus told Nathanael of Cana, and others who 
stood by, that angels were intimately associated 
with him in bringing the gifts of heaven to the 
inhabitants of earth: “Verily, verily, I say unto 
you, Ye shall see the heaven opened, and the 
angels of God ascending and descending upon 


The Angels in Heaven 47 


the Son of man” (John i. 51). The form of the 
affirmation is suggested, no doubt, by the ladder 
that Jacob saw in his dream at Bethel (Gen. 
xxvill. 12); but the underlying truth that Jesus 
here taught is the intercourse between God and 
his human children which the atoning Son has 
made real by his mediation, and in which the 
angels are his ready assistants and messengers. 
As Frederic Louis Godet well puts it: ‘‘The 
angels are here presented by Jesus as an army 
grouped around their chief, the Son of man, 
who says to one, Go, and to another, Do this. 
These servants ascend first, to seek power in the 
presence of God; afterwards, they descend again 
to accomplish the work’? (Com. on John, 
tn loc.).1 Dr. Lyman Abbott gives his interpre- 
tation of this passage as follows: ‘‘ Christ opened 
the communication between earth and heaven; 
manifested that fact by the angelic appearances 
which accompanied his coming, his presence, 
and his departure; still manifests it, by the 
spiritual blessings which he constantly confers 
in answer to the prayers of his people; and will 
finally manifest it yet more gloriously when he 
comes to take possession of his established 
kingdom, with his holy angels with him. The 
past and present fulfillments of this prophecy 
are but fragmentary and imperfect. The final 


‘Funk & Wagnalls, publishers, New York. 


48 Whai Jesus Said about Heaven 


and perfect fulfillment awaits us in the future” 
(Com. on John, zz loc.).? 

That the angels are subject to Christ is 
evidenced by the words he spoke to Simon 
Peter, who had just struck off the ear of a 
servant of the high priest in attempting to 
prevent the arrest of Jesus that night in Geth- 
semane. The rash act of his disciple was re- 
buked by the Master in these stern words: 
‘‘Put up again thy sword into its place; for 
all they that take the sword shall perish with 
the sword. Or thinkest thou that I cannot 
beseech my Father, and he shall even now send 
me more than twelve legions of angels?’’ (Matt. 
xxvi. 52, 53). The implication is unmistakable 
that the angels of heaven were ever ready to 
come to the side of Jesus with all their loyalty 
and strength, to render him service when he so 
desired. 

As servants of Christ the angels will attend 
him when he shall come in his glory to judge 
the nations (Matt. xxv. 31, 32). ‘“‘And he shall 
send forth his angels with a great sound of a 
trumpet, and they shall gather together his 
elect from the four winds, from one end of 
heaven to the other’? (Matt. xxiv. 31). In 
explaining to his disciples the Parable of the 
Tares, Jesus said: ‘‘ The harvest is the end of the 


2A. S. Barnes & Company, publishers, New York. 


The Angels in Heaven 49 


world; and the reapers are angels. ... The Son 
of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall 
gather out of his kingdom all things that cause 
stumbling, and them that do iniquity, and shall 
cast them into the furnace of fire’’ (Matt. xiii. 
39, 41, 42). These utterances of Jesus abun- 
dantly sustain the assertion that the angels of 
heaven were at his command in the days of his 
earthly ministry, and that they are still subject 
to him, ready to do his bidding at the end of the 
world and beyond in all the ages to come. 

Jesus taught also that angels are guardians 
of little children and of childlike disciples. The 
Apostles were inclined to repel those who 
brought their little ones to him for a blessing; 
but he rebuked the objectors, told them that 
his kingdom belonged to such as these, and 
warned them against underrating the lowly and 
obscure: ‘‘See that ye despise not one of these 
little ones; for I say unto you, that in heaven 
their angels do always behold the face of my 
Father who is in heaven” (Matt xviii. 10). 
From this passage chiefly has arisen the doctrine 
of guardian angels, concerning which various 
views are held. Dr. John A. Broadus says: 
“There is in this no sufficient warrant for the 
popular notion of ‘guardian angels,’ one angel 
especially assigned to each individual; it is 
simply said of believers as a class that there are 
angels which are their angels; but there is 

4 


50 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


nothing here or elsewhere to show that one 
angel has special charge of one believer. ... 
However humble in the estimation of worldly 
men, believers have angels as their attendants, 
sent forth to serve God for their benefit (Heb. 1. 
14), and these angels of theirs enjoy in heaven 
the highest dignity and consideration, like 
persons admitted to the very presence of a 
monarch, and allowed, not once, but continual- 
ly, to behold his face. .. . It cannot be positively 
asserted that the idea of guardian angels is an 
error, but there is no Scripture which proves 
it true, and passages which merely might be 
understood that way do not suffice for the 
basis of a doctrine’? (Com. on Matt., 27 loc.).3 
On the other hand, the great exegete Meyer 
comments on this passage in these plain words, 
** The belief that every individual has a guardian 
angel . . . is here confirmed by Jesus’’; and he 
further says that these angels always behold the 
Father’s face, ‘‘inasmuch as they are ever in 
immediate proximity to God’s glory in heaven, 
and therefore belong to the highest order 
of angels’? (Com. on Matt., zu /oc.).4. With this 
view Dr. Lyman Abbott is in substantial ac- 
cord. He says that ‘“‘their angels’’ here means 


3American Commentary on Matthew, by Dr. John 
A. Broadus; American Baptist Publication Society, 
publishers, Philadelphia. 

4Funk & Wagnalls, publishers, New York. 


The Angels 1n Heaven 51 


their guardian angels. ‘Here are intended the 
celestial messengers who are allotted as the 
special guardians of God’s children. Not their 
departed spirits after death, but their guardian 
angels while they live, are represented as near- 
est the throne. That is, they always have im- 
mediate and direct access to God. The picture 
is interpreted by the usage of courts, where 
certain special favorite officers always have 
access to the throne. Without pressing the 
language, which is seemingly metaphorical, as 
all language descriptive of the spiritual world 
must be, it evidently implies the doctrine of 
guardian angels—that angels are not only in 
general the ministering servants of God, but 
that special angels are allotted as the special 
guardians and attendants of individuals; and 
that the weakest and feeblest of God’s flock, 
not merely the children, but the little ones in 
intellectual and spiritual power and in ecclesias- 
tical position and earthly honor, have the readi- 
est and nearest access to God’’ (Com. on Matt.).5 
In this case, as in others where eminent exposi- 
tors express different opinions, it becomes the 
rest of us to avoid dogmatism and judge for our- 
selves in the light of all the knowledge that we 
may possess. 

In the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus 


5A, S. Barnes & Company, publishers, New York. 


52 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


there is at least a strong suggestion that angels 
include in their functions as ‘ministering 
spirits’? the conveying those who die in the 
Lord to their home in heaven. Jesus says of 
Lazarus: ‘‘It came to pass that the beggar died, 
and that he was carried away by the angels into 
Abraham’s bosom”’ (Luke xvi. 22). The drap- 
ery is figurative, of course, heaven being 
presented to the imagination as a banquet hall, 
where host and guests recline on couches, with 
Abraham, father of the faithful, in the chief 
place, and the former beggar lying next to him, 
with his head resting close to the patriarch’s 
breast. Such a figure made strong appeal to 
the Jewish mind. To us, of course, Abraham’s 
bosom means Paradise, or heaven; and the fact 
that angels are shown as the agents who carried 
Lazarus home makes it probable, if not certain, 
that they are appointed to render a similar 
service to every dying saint. This thought has 
gladdened the hearts of many weary pilgrims, 
and one of them who lived more than three- 
score years ago expressed his feelings in the 
well-known lines: 


“I’ve almost gained my heavenly home, 
My spirit loudly sings; 

Thy holy ones, behold, they come! 
I hear the noise of wings. 


The Angels in Heaven ie 


*O come, angel band, 
Come and around me stand; 
O bear me away on your snowy wings 
To my immortal home.”’ 


Jesus explicitly teaches also that the angels 
in heaven are acquainted with at least some of 
the events that are taking place in this world, 
that they are deeply interested in human affairs, 
and that their hearts rejoice whenever a sinful 
soul on earth renounces his sins and seeks 
pardon and cleansing in the mercy of God. In 
the twin Parables of the Lost Sheep and the 
Lost Coin he says, ‘‘ There shall be joy in heaven 
over one sinner that repenteth, more than over 
ninety and nine righteous persons, who need 
no repentance’’; and he expressly includes the 
angels in the further saying: ‘‘I say unto you, 
there is joy in the presence of the angels of God 
over one sinner that repenteth’’ (Luke xv. 7, 
10). No doubt, this joy is shared by redeemed 
saints in heaven, if they too are cognizant of 
what is occurring here below. But it is not 
revealed in the words of Jesus whether or not 
they are included in this knowledge and the 
resultant joy. Of angelic sympathy and glad- 
ness, however, we are sure. 

But the knowledge of the angels is limited, 
for they are finite. Concerning the Second 
Coming of the Son of man, Jesus said: “‘Of that 


54. What Jesus Said about Heaven 


day or that hour knoweth no one, not even the 
angels in heaven, neither the Son, but the 
Father’? (Mark xiii. 32). While inhabiting a 
human body even Christ was to some extent 
limited in knowledge; the angels, who are created 
beings, cannot be omniscient. Like ourselves, 
they must be taught. 


CHAPTER VII 
THE SAINTS IN HEAVEN: CERTAINTY 


HAT Christ’s true disciples are destined 

to dwell in Heaven eternally is just as 
certain as it is that he himself will be there. 
In many terms and at various times he gave 
that assurance in the teachings which the 
Evangelists recorded. When the _ seventy 
heralds of the kingdom of God that he sent forth 
had completed their mission and returned to 
him with joy, saying, ‘‘Lord, even the demons 
are subject unto us in thy name,” he told them 
not to let their chief gladness be inspired by the 
subjection of evil spirits, but to ‘‘rejoice that 
your names are written in heaven’”’ (Luke x. 
17-20). The figure is that of a register in which 
are enrolled the names of those who are already 
citizens of heaven, even while they yet dwell 
upon earth. Both in the Old Testament and in 
the New the figure of a heavenly register is 
repeatedly used. ‘Our citizenship is in 
heaven,’’ says the Apostle Paul (Phil. iii. 20), 
and while the saint is a sojourner in this world 
his true home is above and his name is on the 
register of the Heavenly Commonwealth. Ac- 
cordingly, in the same Epistle, Paul speaks of 
certain godly women and other “‘fellow work- 

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56 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


ers, whose names are in the book of life’’ (Phil. 
iv. 3). In similar phrase the writer of the 
Epistle to the Hebrews alludes to ‘‘the general 
assembly and church of the firstborn who are 
enrolled in heaven’’ (Heb. xii. 23). And inthe - 
Revelation of John (xxi. 27) it is declared that 
nothing unclean shall enter the Heavenly City, 
‘but only they that are written in the Lamb’s 
book of life.’’ Let it be said again that this is a 
figure of speech, for only thus can spiritual 
realities be conveyed to our dull human com- 
prehension. But at the same time it should be 
carefully noted that there is a divine reality 
behind the figure, which is that the saints of 
God, Christ’s true disciples, are set apart in this 
world to a glorious destiny in the world to come. 
To use the words of the Apostle Peter, there is 
‘fan inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, 
and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven 
for you, who by the power of God are guarded 
through faith unto a salvation ready to be 
revealed in the last time’’ (1 Pet. i. 4, 5). 

That heaven is assured to those who are found 
at last with names inscribed in the Book of Life 
is implied in the assurance of Jesus to his dis- 
ciples as recorded in the Sermon on the Mount. 
Announcing the Beatitude of those who are 
‘‘persecuted for righteousness’ sake,’’ he said to 
al! such: ‘‘ Rejoice, and be exceeding glad; for 
great is your reward in heaven: for so persecuted 


The Saints in Heaven: Certainty 57 


they the prophets that were before you”’ (Matt. 
v. 10-12). Here the Master not only affirms the 
heavenly residence of his followers in the future 
life, but tells them explicitly that they shall find 
there a reward for all their hardships and 
fidelity in this world, and that the reward shall 
be great. Something of the nature and extent 
of that “‘reward’’ is indicated in the Parable 
of the Talents, where the ‘good and faithful 
servant’’ who had been “faithful over a few 
things’? was promoted to a more important 
trust, and told, “‘Enter thou into the joy of thy 
lord.” This reward was bestowed by the 
master of those servants, not only upon the 
one who improved five talents, but also and 
equally upon him who had improved two 
talents (Matt. xxv. 21, 23). Fidelity to trusts 
committed, not the largeness of results at- 
tained, was the basis and measure of the re- 
ward. The “lord’’ in the Parable represents 
the Lord of the Kingdom of Heaven; and Jesus 
here meant to teach that his saints are to be 
rewarded in heaven for their fidelity upon earth, 
and that the reward of each will be great and 
satisfying. 

This great reward is presented in another 
form by our Lord in the closing sentence of his 
description of the Judgment scene as recorded 
in the Gospel according to Matthew (xxv. 46): 
Speaking of the wicked, whose doom is pro- 


58 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


nounced by the King, it is said, ‘‘These shall 
go away into eternal punishment’; but the 
destiny of those on the right hand is declared in 
the words, ‘‘ but the righteous into eternal life.’ 
To similar purpose, but in somewhat different 
terms, Jesus characterized this great reward in 
an assurance given to Peter and the other dis- 
ciples. Peter had somewhat indelicately alluded 
to the sacrifices that he and the others had made 
in order to follow him, and the Master’s reply 
was: ‘‘Verily I say unto you, There is no man 
that hath left house, or wife, or brethren, or 
parents, or children, for the kingdom of God’s 
sake, who shall not receive manifold more in 
this time, and in the world to come eternal life’’ 
(Luke xviii. 28-30). The full contents of that 
familiar phrase ‘‘eternal life’? no human mind 
and heart can compass in this world, and eterni- 
ty itself may not suffice to reveal all its glories. 
Let it be said with emphasis, however, that its 
meaning is not chiefly an affirmation of ever- 
lasting duration, though that is certainly 
implied. Eternal life is chiefly a thing of quali- 
ty, and not of quantity or duration. Its leading 
characteristic seems to be intimate and pro- 
gressive fellowship with God the Father and 
with Jesus Christ his Son, as expressed by Jesus 
himself in the prayer which he uttered on the 
evening before his death: ‘‘ Father, the hour is 
come; glorify thy Son, that the Son may glorify 


The Saints in Heaven: Certainty 59 


thee: even as thou gavest him authority over 
all flesh, that to all whom thou hast given him, 
he should give eternal life. And this is life 
eternal, that they should know thee the only 
true God, and him whom thou didst send, even 
Jesus Christ’’ (John xvii. 1-3). In our present 
state of knowledge it must content us to know 
that there is great reward in heaven for those 
who are faithful to the Master on earth, and 
that a chief element of that reward will be life 
eternal with all the glories that the term implies. 

When is that great reward to begin? Is there 
to be a long interval between the fidelity of the 
earthly life and the glory of the life to come? 
Shall the saints be consigned to some shadowy 
place called Sheol, or Hades, to grope their way 
in semi-darkness, as many of the ancients and 
some of the Old Testament writers imagined? 
Or must the soul along with the body be interred 
in the grave and remain unconscious until the 
Last Day? Such ideas have been advocated by 
good people. Be sure that this is not the teach- 
ing of Jesus. On the cross amid the agonies of 
crucifixion he shed light upon the destiny of the 
repentant and trusting soul. When one of the 
robbers who were crucified with him implored, 
‘Jesus, remember me when thou comest in thy 
kingdom,”’ the dying but omnipotent Saviour 
replied: “‘ Verily I say unto thee, To-day shalt 
thou be with me in Paradise” (Luke xxiii. 42, 


60 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


43). In the vocabulary of Jesus Paradise was 
identical with heaven. The inference is valid, 
if not irresistible, that the dying saint enters 
heaven immediately and that the great reward 
begins at once. It seems to me that these 
things are as certain as that Christ is true. 


CHAPTER VIII 
THE SAINTS IN HEAVEN: DIGNITY 


HE great reward which Jesus assured his 
disciples was to be their portion in heaven, 
and which extends to all his saints in every age 
and clime, implies certain dignities and honors 
that may well claim our attention just here. 
One of these dignities is equality with the 
angels who never sinned, and whose privilege 
it is to behold the Father’s face and go forth to 
do his will. Jesus told the Sadducees who were 
trying to entrap him with a question about the 
resurrection, that they were in error because 
they knew not the Scriptures, nor the power of 
God. In the resurrection, he said, the righteous 
will not be bound by the conditions that 
marked their earthly lives, but will be ‘‘equal 
unto the angels”’ (Luke xx. 36; Matt. xxii. 30; 
Mark xii. 25). This does not mean, it is worth 
while to say, that saints when they reach heaven 
will become angels, thus losing something of 
their human identity. The once-popular Sun- 
day school song, ‘‘I want to be an angel, and 
with the angels stand,’ may have voiced a 
worthy aspiration, but there is no warrant in 
the teachings of Jesus to show that the con- 
ception is accurate. ‘As the angels,’’ or ‘‘equal 


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62 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


unto the angels,’”’ is what the Master said. 
He specified two things in which this equality 
with angels consists: one of them, that there is 
no more death for them, and the other, that 
the marriage relation will have ceased forever. 
We have seen in a previous chapter that the . 
angels are highly exalted. Jesus said they are 
“‘holy’’; that they are his trusted agents in con- 
veying heavenly gifts to mankind; that they 
will attend him when he comes to judge. the 
nations; that they are intrusted with the 
guardianship of little children and adults of 
childlike spirit; that they are filled with joy 
when sinners repent; in short, his words imply 
that angels are holy and happy in communion 
with God and one another, and honored with 
the privilege of ministration to God’s earthly 
children in their times of need. It is evident, 
therefore, that the saints will be clothed with 
honors beyond our present ability to conceive, 
when they take their places in the celestial 
world as the peers and companions of angels. 
In connection with his declaration to the 
Sadducees, as quoted above, Jesus made 
another affirmation—that ‘‘they who are ac- 
counted worthy to attain to that world, and 
the resurrection from the dead, .. . are sons of 
God, being sons of the resurrection’’ (Luke xx. 
35, 36). The meaning seems to be that the son- 
ship which existed while the saint was still upon 


The Saints tn Heaven: Dignity 63 


earth, and which enabled him to say, ‘‘Abba, 
Father,’’ to God, is exalted into some higher 
degree in heaven as he takes his place in the 
ranks of the glorified. Being now “‘sons of the 
resurrection,’ having passed through the trans- 
formation which the resurrection with its spirit- 
ual body effects, the saints are endued with a 
dignity of divine sonship that was impossible to 
them while still hampered by earthly conditions. 
Assons of theresurrection and children of Godin 
heaven, the saints will realize as never before 
the fullness of meaning embraced in that saying 
of Jesus on a crucial occasion: ‘‘ Whosoever shall 
do the will of my Father who is in heaven, he is 
my brother, and sister, and mother’’ (Matt. xii. 
50). While this close relation between the Son 
of God and his true disciples is a glorious fact 
even here on earth, its glory is enhanced by the 
resurrection experience which the saint has 
passed through in fellowship with his Saviour. 
So that, when the Risen Christ shall take the 
risen saint by the hand and with a smile of 
welcome say, ‘‘My brother, my sister, my 
mother,’’ a new and brighter element will be 
added to that heavenly relationship. 

This exalted relation will receive public 
recognition, according to these words of Jesus: 
‘‘Every one therefore who shall confess me be- 
fore men, him will I also confess before my 
Father who is in heaven” (Matt. x. 32). And 


64 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


if in the Father’s presence this great confession 
is made, then it will be made also in the presence 
of angels, archangels, glorified saints of all the 
ages from Abel to the last one who entered the 
gates of Paradise, and of all the holy and happy 
intelligences of the universe. Is there any 
dignity higher than this? 

Yes, there seems to be a further exaltation 
implied in certain other sayings of Jesus. On 
a certain occasion late in his earthly ministry, 
when a contention had arisen among his dis- 
ciples as to which of them was accounted to be 
greatest, he explained to them patiently that 
greatness in his kingdom was based upon 
humble service, and then assured them that, as 
they had continued with him in his temptations, 
he would reward them with appropriate honors: 
“I appoint unto you a kingdom, even as my 
Father appointed unto me, that ye may eat 
and drink at my table in my kingdom; and ye 
shall sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of 
Israel’? (Luke xxii. 29, 30). Substantially the 
same promise was given in reply to Peter’s ques- 
tion: ‘‘Lo, we have left all, and followed thee; 
what then shall we have? And Jesus said unto 
them, Verily I say unto you, that ye who have 
followed me, in the regeneration when the Son 
of man shall sit on the throne of his glory, ye 
also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the 
twelve tribes of Israel’? (Matt. xix. 27, 28). 


The Saints in Heaven: Dignity 65 


Note in this connection the invitation extended 
to those on the right hand of the Judge in the 
scene depicted by Jesus in Matthew’s record: 
‘‘Then shall the King say unto them on his 
right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, 
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the 
foundation of the world’? (Matt. xxv. 34). 
In these passages Jesus declares not merely 
that his disciples will be admitted to share as 
subjects in his heavenly kingdom, but also that 
they are to possess great dignity and authority. 
It has been remarked by a wise interpreter that 
while the promise of sitting upon thrones and 
exercising the functions of judge is upon its 
face a personal promise to the disciples who were 
with Jesus at the time, yet ‘‘elsewhere are to 
be found promises, apparently to all the saints, 
of sharing with Christ, in a manner which is not 
explained, in his office of Judge and King.”’ 
The same writer adds this conclusion: ‘‘What- 
ever else this promise may mean, it certainly 
imports the possession of a celestial office of 
great trust, dignity, and importance’”’ (Lyman 
Abbott, Com. on Matt.).!. A reminiscence of this 
great promise may be found in Paul’s appeal to 
the Christians of the Corinthian Church, who 
were suing one another in the heathen courts: 
‘‘Know ye not that the saints shall judge the 





1A, S. Barnes & Company, publishers, New York, 
5 


66 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


world? and if the world is judged by you, are ye 
unworthy to judge the smallest matters? Know 
ye not that we shall judge angels? how much 
more, things that pertain to this life?’’ (1 Cor. 
vi. 2, 3). In our necessary ignorance of the 
details of the heavenly life it is impossible to 
give a more definite judgment of what is implied 
in the kingdom, thrones, and judicial powers 
that Jesus promises in these passages. We can 
only say, with the writer quoted above, that 
they certainly mean the possession of a celestial 
office of great trust, dignity, and importance. 
What this office includes of dignity and honor, 
as well as of responsibility, will be revealed to 
each of us when “‘this mortal shall have put on 
immortality.” 

‘‘Then shall the righteous shine forth as the 
sun in the kingdom of their Father,’’ said Jesus 
in his interpretation of his Parable of the Tares 
of the Field (Matt. xiii. 43). He had just said 
that ‘‘in the end of the world the Son of man 
shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather 
out of his kingdom all things that cause stum- 
bling, and them that do iniquity, and shall cast 
them into the furnace of fire; there shall be the 
weeping and the gnashing of teeth.’”’ And in 
sharp contrast with this gloom and anguish 
he places the entrancing picture of a great 
company of redeemed saints, whose faces are 
shining like the sun and whose garments are 


The Saints in Heaven: Dignity 67 


luminous as the light. We are reminded of the 
glory of the Transfiguration, in which the sub- 
lime figure of the Son of God appeared to the 
three disciples through the surrounding dark- 
ness—‘‘his face did shine as the sun, and his 
garments became white as the light’’ (Matt. 
xvii. 2). And we remember the words of the 
Beloved Disciple: ‘‘ Now are we children of God, 
and it is not yet made manifest what we shall 
be. We know that, if he shall be manifested, 
we shall be like him; for we shall see him even 
as he is’’ (1 John iii. 2). In this world the true 
disciples of the lowly Nazarene are often obscure 
and but little appreciated by those who are 
striving after wealth and carnal pleasure. But 
in the world to come they shall be forever 
separate from all evil associations and allure- 
ments, their real worth will be manifest to 
rejoicing angels, and as children of their Father 
they will ‘‘shine forth as the sun,”’ whose radiant 
beams shall nevermore be dimmed. Surely 
these coming honors and dignities that are 
reserved for the saints in heaven may well 
cheer their hearts while still in the house of 
their pilgrimage. 


CHAPTER IX | 
THE SAINTS IN HEAVEN: FELLOWSHIP 


S social beings the followers of Christ have 
found one of their richest privileges on 
earth to be association with their fellow Chris- 
tians and communion by faith with their unseen 
but adored Redeemer. That the ‘“‘fellowship 
of kindred minds’”’ will form a chief element in 
the bliss of the saints in heaven is only what we 
are warranted in expecting from the fore- 
glimpses that come to us here in the flesh. 
Accordingly, it is no surprise to a child of 
God when he reads such words as these that fell 
from the lips of Jesus: ‘If any man serve me, 
let him follow me; and where I am, there shall 
also my servant be’”’ (John xii. 26). Certain 
Greeks desired to see him during Passover week 
in Jerusalem, and he made their visit an oc- 
casion for renewing his teaching about self- 
denial and holy service. The point to be noted 
here is that he who faithfully follows the Master 
in this life will continue to follow him in the life 
to come—that the fellowship of earthly service 
will merge into the fellowship of heavenly com- 
munion. This great fact of fellowship with the 
Saviour in heaven is expressed in the most 
explicit manner in those classic words that have 
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The Saints in Heaven: Fellowship 69 


made music in the hearts and lives of his dis- 
ciples throughout all the Christian centuries: 
“In my Father’s house are many mansions; 
if it were not so, I would have told you; for I 
go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and 
prepare a place for you, I come again, and will 
receive you unto myself; that where I am, there 
ye may be also”’ (John xiv. 2, 3). On the same 
occasion—the evening before his death—he 
uttered this wish in the prayer which reveals 
his innermost heart: “‘ Father, I desire that they 
also whom thou hast given me be with me where 
I am, that they may behold my glory, which 
thou hast given me: for thou lovedst me before 
the foundation of the world’”’ (John xvii. 24). 
Dwell upon these glorious words: ‘‘ Where I am, 
there shall my servant be; there ye may be also; 
that they may behold my glory.” Eternal 
fellowship with Him who loved us and gave 
Himself up for us! The privilege of looking into 
the face of Him who is the brightness of the 
Father’s glory and the express image of His 
person! To hear the entrancing music of His 
voice, who said to the toil-wornand heavy-laden: 
“‘Come unto me, and I will give you rest!” 
To behold His glory, which the Father has 
given to His well-beloved Son, and to share that 
glory through eternal ages, with no fear of 
change, no dread of sin, no apprehension of 


70 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


death! Truly, as Jesus said: ‘“‘Great is your 
reward in heaven.” 

Along with this supreme fellowship with 
Christ we are permitted to anticipate associa- 
tion with our fellow saints in glory. How great 
is their number no mind of man can compute. 
They have been gathering up there from the 
days of righteous Abel until now. Think of 
knowing and associating in heaven with Enoch, 
Abraham, Moses, David, Isaiah and his fellow 
prophets, John the Baptist, John the Beloved 
Disciple, Peter, Paul, Martha -and Mary of 
Bethany, Polycarp, and a myriad of saints who 
followed these illustrious ones in later years. 
Imagine the fellowship of those godly men and 
women, whose memoirs we have read and whose 
characters we have admired and loved, though 
we never beheld their faces nor heard the tones 
of their voices. Picture the joy of clasping 
hands with the pastor who ministered to your 
spiritual needs long ago, the teacher who led 
your young footsteps upward in the Sunday 
school, the comrades who labored by your side 
for years and then preceded you to the land of 
rest and reward. What pleasures await the 
child of God in realizing these anticipations! 

Our own most intimate ones, too—those 
whom we “loved long since and lost awhile”’ 
—father, mother, husband, wife, brother, sister, 
son, daughter, and others who were bound to 


The Saints in Heaven: Fellowship 71 


us on earth by closest ties of love and confidence! 
Think of the reunion with them in the home 
where no prospect of separation will shadow the 
perfect joy of fellowship! Is all this in store for 
the faithful disciples of Jesus? The whole 
teaching of the Master implies it, even if there 
is no explicit declaration of it in his recorded 
words. A careful and candid reading of the 
four Gospels will assure any inquirer that the 
reunion of saints with their loved ones who died 
in the faith and hope of salvation through 
Christ is as certain as the promises of God. 
‘Shall we know each other there?’’ is a 
question often asked by those who have suffered 
keen bereavement. Certainly we shall—why 
not? It is implied in the very nature of things. 
Will heaven bring us into a state of knowledge 
inferior to our intelligence on earth? Could 
there be fellowship without recognition? And 
is not fellowship a cardinal element of that 
heaven which Jesus reveals? It would seem 
that no doubt of the recognition of friends in the 
future life of the saints should ever have arisen 
at all, in view of the implications of Scripture 
and the dictates of sound reason. True, there 
are some shadows that we cannot brush away 
in the present imperfect state of our knowledge 
—as, for example, the apprehension in some 
minds that happiness would be impossible even 
in heaven, if recognition of our saved friends 


42 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


should cause us to miss other friends who were 
not there. The solution of this doubt is in the 
mind of our loving Father, and there it must be. 
left until he shall choose to make it known. 
Meanwhile, we are free to believe most heartily 
in heavenly recognition, because the opposite 
supposition is repugnant to all our social in- 
stincts, and also because it is negatived by the 
whole tenor of New Testament teaching. Let 
us join the Apostle Paul in his confession of 
faith: ‘‘ Now we see in a mirror, darkly; but then 
face to face: now I know in part; but then shall 
I know fully even as also I was fully known’’ 
(1 Cor. xiii. 12). 

Does heavenly recognition involve the re- 
sumption of family relationships, especially 
the marriage tie? Not so. Jesus teaches in 
explicit terms that these ties, at least in their 
physical features, are unknown in heaven. He 
said: ‘‘The sons of this world marry, and are 
given in marriage; but they that are accounted 
worthy to attain to that world, and the resur- 
rection from the dead, neither marry, nor are 
given in marriage: for neither can they die any 
more: for they are equal unto the angels; and 
are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection”’ 
(Luke xx. 34-36; Matt. xxii. 30; Mark xii. 25). 
The Master’s meaning is well interpreted by 
Dr. Lyman Abbott, who says: ‘‘This declara- 
tion does not imply that the angels are the 


The Saints in Heaven: Fellowship 73 


spirits of the departed; on the contrary, it 
discriminates between the two, for it com- 
pares the one to the other. Nor does it imply 
that there is no recognition of friends in heaven 
and no perpetuation of friendship. Nor does it 
involve the literal resurrection of the earthly 
body; on the contrary, it implies a radical differ- 
ence between the celestial and the terrestrial 
body. (Compare 1 Cor. xv. 42-44, 50.) But 
Christ declares that as in heaven there will be 
no more death (Luke xx. 36), so there will be no 
succession and renewal of life, which is the main 
object of marriage; hence the physical relations 
of marriage will not continue to exist’? (Com. 
on Matt.)' Dr. John A. Broadus agrees with 
this view in substance, but is somewhat more 
explicit. He says: “‘There is nothing in this 
statement (of Christ) to forbid the persuasion, 
elsewhere countenanced in Scripture, that the 
relations of earthly life will be remembered in 
the future state, the persons recognized, and 
special affections cherished with delight; and 
we can imagine that exalted and spiritualized 
conjugal affections may then and there exist 
toward more persons than one. The idea is 
hard to accept now, only because we do not 
realize how great changes of feeling will ac- 
company existence in the glorified body (1 Cor. 
xv. 44; Phil. iii. 21). In heaven, the love of 


1A,S. Barnes & Company, publishers, New York. 


74 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


two that were successive husbands may be as 
little mutually exclusive as the love of two 
children or two sisters, and yet be intense, 
peculiar, and delightful. This is another of 
those sayings by which our Lord at one stroke 
cut into the heart of some difficulty, and laid 
it open’? (Commentary on Matt.).2. Let the 
interpretations of these wise men be taken for 
what they are worth; the present writer has 
nothing better to present. 

It is legitimate to inquire, in connection with 
the fellowship of the saints in heaven, whether 
it includes a vision of the Father as well as 
familiar communion with the Saviour, the 
angels, and spirits of just men made perfect. 
Will the Father manifest himself to his human 
children in the future state, apart from the 
revelation which he makes through the Son, and 
will the saints be rewarded with what has been 
called ‘‘the Beatific Vision,’ a direct and vivid 
disclosure of the Father’s face? There are some 
sayings of Scripture which on the surface appear 
to require a negative answer, while others ap- 
pear to favor the affirmative. ‘‘ Blessed are the 
pure in heart, for they shall see God,’”’ may mean 
a vision of the Father up there, as well as a 
spiritual apprehension of him down here. And 
if in heaven the guardian angels of God’s little 


2American Baptist Publication Society, publishers, 
Philadelphia; quoted by permission. 


The Saints in Heaven: Fellowship 75 


ones do always behold the Father’s face, why 
not also the saints whom the Son shall confess 
to the Father in the presence of the angels? 
‘‘Coming the vision of God; coming my bloom 
and my power!’’ So sang one of his saints in 
triumph of faith, and so it is our privilege to 
voice our glad anticipation of the fellowship 
above. 


CHAPTER X 
THE SAINTS IN HEAVEN: EXPERIENCE 


NTERWOVEN with the dignities that the 

saints in heaven shall receive and the fellow- 
ship they shall enjoy are certain experiences 
which Jesus promised his disciples, that call for 
special notice in addition to allusions to them 
that have already been made. 

One of those experiences foretold in explicit 
terms by Him is that of immortality. In his 
Gospel Luke has preserved for us a saying of 
Jesus that does not appear in the other Synop- 
tics. Refuting the error of the Sadducees, who 
sought to confound him with a hard question 
about marriage in the life to come, Jesus replied 
that “they who are accounted worthy to attain 
to that world, and the resurrection from the 
dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage.” 
And then he adds the priceless assurance: 
‘‘Neither can they die any more: for they are 
equal unto the angels; and are sons of God, 
being sons of the resurrection’? (Luke xx. 35, 
36). Here is a definite pledge of immortal life 
to all who are numbered among the true 
disciples of Jesus. When once they have passed 
through the gates of death into the heavenly 

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The Satnis in Heaven: Experience 77 


world, they can never die again, but are death- 
less like the unfallen angels. 

It is difficult to realize in our present limited 
condition what a relief it will be to enter upon a 
state and reside in a place from which death in 
every form is absolutely excluded. We are so 
familiar with sickness, death, funerals, burials, 
with all their attendant heartbreak, that 
imagination staggers in the attempt to conceive 
a condition in which none of these gloomy 
objects can ever have place. The dread of 
death is the cause of many of the densest shadows 
that darken our earthly pathway. Ev ca the 
very best of God’s saints look forward to the 
experience of dissolution with feelings of dis- 
comfort, although they have no reason to fear 
what lies beyond the grave. Truly does the 
writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews (ii. 15) 
speak of them ‘‘who through fear of death were 
all their lifetime subject to bondage’’; for, 
indeed, this fear enslaves our humanity with 
a bondage as cruel as it is universal. But the 
same writer in connection with these words lays 
emphasis upon the cheering fact that Christ 
partook of our human nature and submitted to 
die in our behalf, ‘that through death he might 
bring to naught him that had the power of 
death, that is, the devil; and might deliver all 
them who through fear of death’’ were thus 
enslaved. And now that Christ has risen from 


78 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


the dead, to die no more, his word to all his 
true disciples is: ‘‘Because I live, ye shall live 
also’’ (John xiv. 19). This assurance of immor- 
tality in union with the Lord finds its worthy 
echo from the Isle of Patmos in the words that 
John heard from “‘a great voice out of heaven’’: 
‘*God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; 
and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, 
nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain; 
for the former things are passed away’’ (Rev. 
xxi. 4). 

The passage just quoted leads us to speak 
more particularly of the experience of comfort 
which the saints in heaven will enjoy. Not only 
is death excluded from heaven, but sorrow, pain, 
tears, and all other discomforts are forever shut 
out. The whole tenor of Christ’s teaching, as 
recorded in the Gospels, gives assurance of this 
heavenly comfort. There is more than a hint 
of it in the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus 
where Abraham is represented as telling the man 
whose cry for help had reached him across the 
‘“‘oreat gulf’? that separated between Paradise 
and the place of torment, that while he, the once 
rich man, was in anguish, Lazarus, the poor 
afflicted beggar, whom the angels had conveyed 
to the celestial banquet hall, was the subject 
of loving comfort. ‘‘ Now here he is comforted,”’ 
said Father Abraham. Taken in connection 
with other sayings of Jesus, this glimpse of the 


The Sainis in Heaven: Experience 79 


life above is full of cheer to those who are in 
need of heavenly comfort. The mission of Jesus 
to this world was largely one of comfort to the 
distressed. One of the Beatitudes in the Sermon 
on the Mount declares: ‘‘ Blessed are they that 
mourn; for they shall be comforted’’ (Matt. v. 
4). ‘‘Be of good comfort,’ was.a favorite ex- 
pression of his, when the afflicted appealed to 
him for help. ‘I will not leave you comfort- 
less,’’ was an assurance which he gave his dis- 
ciples when they were dismayed at the news of 
his approaching departure from them. “I will 
pray the Father, and he shall give you another 
Comforter, that he may be with you for ever, 
even the Spirit of truth,’’ was the promise with 
which he consoled them for the loss to be 
occasioned by his own withdrawal. It is in 
harmony with all these words of the Master 
concerning the comfort that His people should 
have on earth under the ministrations of the 
Divine Spirit, that the heavenly life is repre- 
sented as free from all that which might cause 
unhappiness, and full of that comfort which all 
weary souls covet but never experience in per- 
fection here below. It is no matter of surprise 
that we find in the writings of Paul and the 
other Apostolic authors many echoes of the 
teachings of the Master upon this subject. 
Akin to this experience of comfort in the 
heavenly life is that of joy, which may be viewed 


80 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


as comfort intensified. In the Parable of the 
Talents (Matt. xxv.), Jesus represents the lord 
of the servants as saying to the one who had 
been faithful in using his capital of five talents: 
‘‘Well done, thou good and faithful servant: 
thou hast been faithful over a few things, I will 
set thee over many things; enter thou into the 
joy of thy lord.”” —The same commendation with 
its gracious invitation is given to the servant 
who had improved the two talents intrusted to 
him. What was meant by entering into the joy 
of his lord is left to our imagination to conceive. 
No doubt, it meant honor, closer fellowship with 
the master, probably a banquet and feasting; 
at all events, it indicated a promotion that 
would be fraught with joy. Let it be remem- 
bered that this “‘lord’’ in the parable is meant 
to represent our Lord and Master, who will 
reward each of his faithful servants with com- 
mendation of his faithfulness, promotion to a 
place of greater dignity and _ responsibility, 
and admission into closer fellowship with him- 
self. To disciples of Jesus the invitation of their 
Master, ‘‘ Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord,” 
will mean introduction to an experience of bliss 
beyond all power of human mind and heart 
to conceive until this mortal shall have put on 
immortality. On the lips of Jesus the words 
‘‘my joy’’ was an expression that his disciples 
often heard and sometimes recorded. For 


The Saints in Heaven: Experience 81 


example, he said: ‘‘These things have I spoken 
unto you, that my joy may be in you, and that 
your joy may be made full” (John xv. 11). And 
in his prayer on the evening before his death 
he said to the Father: ‘‘ Now I come to thee; and 
these things I speak in the world, that they (the 
disciples) may have my joy made full in them- 
selves’? (John xvii. 13). The joy which filled 
the heart of Jesus, even while burdened with the 
sins and sorrows of the people about him, found 
its source in conscious purity from personal sin 
and fault, unbroken fellowship with the Father 
whose beloved Son and Representative he was, 
and the opportunity and power of service to 
the souls and bodies of men which his earthly 
life afforded him. It was the joy of holiness, 
of love to God and man, of opening up before 
despairing humanity the way of salvation from 
all sin and ultimately from all evil whatso- 
ever. 

When he finished the work which the Father 
had given him to do on earth, and ascended to 
his mediatorial seat at the Father’s right hand in 
heaven, his joy was intensified, no doubt, as he 
found his own purity reflected in all the happy 
spirits about him, as communion with the 
Father and with saints and angels became more 
vivid than had been possible while enveloped in 
the shadows of his earthly experience, and as he 


saw the auspicious beginnings and progress of 
6 


82 What Jesus Said aboui Heaven 


that Kingdom which he had given his life to 
introduce and establish on earth. This in part 
is what is included in the expression, ‘‘the joy 
of thy Lord.”’ | 

To participate in this joy of the Saviour in 
heaven will be the crowning experience of the 
the saints. Theirs will be the joy of conscious 
purity also, and to them will it be given to have 
unbroken and satisfying fellowship with Christ 
and the Father whose love gave Christ to man- 
kind, and communion with unfallen angels, as 
well as with a great multitude of noble human 
souls from all lands and every age. To them 
will come also the gladness of knowing that the 
good work which they did on earth in the 
Master’s name for the benefit of their fellow 
men abides in the lives of many, and will go on 
multiplying in gracious and redeeming in- 
fluences through all the ages to come. Said 
Jesus to his disciples on one occasion: ‘‘ Rejoice 
that your names are written in heaven.” If 
the foreknowledge that our names have been 
entered upon the celestial register as citizens 
of heaven is a matter of rejoicing, how much 
greater will be the joy when we come into the 
fullness of that citizenship, and take our places 
in that innumerable company who, having come 
out of great tribulation, ‘‘have washed their 
robes and made them white in the blood of the 
Lamb”’ (Rev. vii. 14). 


CHAPTER XI 
THE SAINTS IN HEAVEN: OCCUPATION 


T seems somewhat remarkable that there is 
no explicit word of Jesus recorded in the 
Gospels concerning the occupations, or employ- 
ments, of redeemed souls in heaven. There are 
utterances of his that set forth definitely the 
certainty of the blessed hereafter, the dignities 
and honors that the saints are to receive, the 
fellowship they are destined to enjoy, and the 
blessed experiences of comfort and gladness 
that are reserved for them in the Celestial City. 
But concerning the employments and activities 
of the saints in glory there is no plain affirmation 
in the recorded sayings of Jesus, and we are left 
to gather what light we can from his general 
teachings with their apparent implications. 
One of his utterances that may serve us here is a 
sentence in the Lord’s Prayer: ‘‘Thy will be 
done, as in heaven, so on earth’”’ (Matt. vi. 10). 
Here it is plainly implied that the Heavenly 
Father’s will is done in heaven, and this means, 
of course, that it is done by saints as well as by 
the unfallen angels. It is certain that in heaven 
all the inhabitants do the will of God promptly, 
gladly, and with all possible efficiency. 
When we try to specify what the will of the 
(83) 


84 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


Father is in connection with the employments 
of the saints above, it is possible to obtain some 
light from the Master’s words elsewhere. For 
example, in the Parable of the Rich Man and 
Lazarus Jesus represents Abraham as telling the 
former rich man in the other world: ‘‘ Remember 
that thou in thy lifetime receivedst thy good 
things, and Lazarus in like manner evil things; 
but now here he is comforted, and thou art in 
anguish’”’ (Luke xvi. 25). As the former beggar 
is here pictured enjoying a banquet in company 
with Abraham in Paradise, it is inevitable that 
his condition should be associated with the idea 
of Rest. So that we may take our Lord’s word 
here as at least a strong hint that one of the 
occupations of the saints in glory will be to rest 
from the toil and weariness of their earthly life. 
This thought receives explicit and repeated con- 
firmation in other parts of the New Testament. 
The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews, in 
delineating the experience of the toil-worn 
Israelites in the wilderness under the leadership 
of Moses and Joshua, concludes with this gen- 
eral assurance: ‘‘ There remaineth therefore a 
sabbath rest for the people of God’”’ (Heb. iv. 9). 
This rest is to be spiritual as well as physical, 
and its sphere is heaven rather than earth. 


John upon the island of Patmos heard a voice | 


from heaven saying: ‘‘Write, Blessed are the 
dead who die in the Lord from henceforth: yea, 


The Saints in Heaven: Occupation 85 


saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their 
labors; for their works follow with them”’ (Rev. 
xiv. 13). In view of passages like these it is not 
a perversion of the Master’s meaning to believe 
that the final rest of heaven is included in his 
great invitation and promise: ‘‘Come unto me, 
all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will 
give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and 
learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: 
and ye shall find rest unto your souls’”’ (Matt. 
xi. 29). The rest that Jesus imparts to earth’s 
weary ones who trust in him is a rest that 
begins and develops in the life that now is, and 
finds its complete fulfillment in the life to come. 

It is very certain that the element of Worship 
will enter largely into the occupations of the 
saints in heaven. It will be no hardship for the 
redeemed to vary the rest of heaven with fre- 
quent seasons of adoration and praise to the 
Father and his redeeming Son. Indeed it is 
certain that a deep current of joyous worship 
will flow continually in the hearts of the saints, 
even while resting quietly from their labors. 
As to worship as one of the occupations of the 
dwellers in heaven, we have a hint in the song 
of the angels who saluted the ears of the shep- 
herds on the night that Jesus was born with 
their strains of praise: ‘‘Glory to God in the 
highest, and on earth peace among men in 
whom he is well pleased’”’ (Luke ii. 14). But it 


86 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


is in the Revelation of John that we find vivid 
pictures of heaven as a place of worship, in 
which both saints and angels participate. Of 
the various passages, this one may be quoted as 
representative of all: ‘‘After these things I saw, 
and behold, a great multitude, which no man 
could number, out of every nation and of all 
tribes and peoples and tongues, standing before 
the throne and before the Lamb, arrayed in 
white robes, and palms in their hands; and they 
cry with a great voice, saying, Salvation unto 
our God who sitteth on the throne, and unto the 
Lamb. And all the angels’ were standing 
round about the throne, and about the elders 
and the four living creatures; and they fell 
before the throne on their faces, and worshiped 
God, saying, Amen: Blessing, and glory, and 
wisdom, and thanksgiving, and honor, and 
power, and might, be unto our God for ever and 
ever. Amen.”’ (Rev. vii. 9-12). Such a picture 
is adapted to fire one’s imagination, and to 
quicken his desire to join that happy throng 
whose praises mingle with the anthems of the 
angels in the presence of the eternal throne. 
There is ample reason to believe that one of 
the chief occupations of the saints in heaven 
will be the rendering of Service to others ac- 
cording to plans that the Infinite Father will 
reveal in the onward progress of the ages. “‘Thy 
will be done in heaven”’ can surely mean no less 


The Saints in Heaven: Occupation 87 


than this, for in the earthly life God’s servants 
do his will best when they are best serving their 
fellows. Is it not true also, that equality with 
the angels which Jesus affirms of the saints in 
glory will include fellowship with them in useful 
service, as well as in rendering worship to God 
and the Lamb? This seems to be a fair infer- 
ence, and it opens up an inviting vista of happy 
occupation for Christ’s redeemed. Another 
significant utterance of Jesus is recorded by 
John in connection with the visit of certain 
Greeks during Passion Week: “‘If any man serve 
me, let him follow me; and where I am, there 
shall also my servant be’’ (John xii. 26). Here 
there seems to be an intimation that those who 
follow Jesus and serve him in this world shall 
not only be with him in heaven but shall serve 
him there also. Death shall have no power to 
put an end to, nor even seriously interrupt, the 
glad service that the disciple shall render his 
beloved Master. ‘‘O death, where is thy vic- 
tory?” There is a glad recognition of this 
heavenly service in the Revelation of St. John. 
In his vision of the great multitude before the 
throne, John heard one of the elders say to him: 
“These are they that come out of the gteat 
tribulation, and they washed their robes, and 
made them white in the blood of the Lamb. 
Therefore are they before the throne of Gow; 
and they serve him day and night in his temple” 


88 What Jesus Said aboui Heaven 


(Rev. vii. 14,15). A kindred passage is in Rev- 
elation xxii. 3: ‘And there shall be no curse any 
more; and the throne of God and of the Lamb 
shall be therein; and his servants shall serve 
him; and they shall see his face.”’ 

This view of heaven as a place of holy service 
is expressed in various ways by eminent 
scholars. Dr. A. H. Strong says: ‘‘The repre- 
sentation of heaven as a city seems intended 
to suggest intensity of life, variety of occupa- 
tion, and closeness of relation to others. . . 
Heaven will involve rest from defective physical 
organization and surroundings, as well as from 
the remains of evil in our hearts. It will be a 
rest consistent with service, an activity without 
weariness, a service which is perfect freedom”’ 
(‘Systematic Theology,’ p. 585).1. Another 
writer says: ‘“We must suppose, then, that 
there will be, even in the heavenly world, a 
diversity of tastes, of labors, and of employ- 
ments, and that to one person this, to another 
that field, in the boundless kingdom of truth 
and of useful occupation, will be assigned for 
his cultivation, according to his peculiar 
powers, qualifications, and tastes’? (McClintock 
and Strong’s Cyclopedia, Vol. IV, p. 127).2 
And that most winsome of theologians, Dr. 


‘American Baptist Publication Society, publishers, 
Philadelphia. 
*Harper & Brothers, publishers, New York. 


‘The Saints in Heaven: Occupation 89 


William Newton Clarke, says concerning the 
soul that has attained to the heavenly life: ‘‘He 
is under the most holy and inspiring influences, 
where all that is best in him is constantly helped 
to increase. All characteristic activities of the 
Christ-like life are open to him. The grade 
of being in which he finds himself is higher than 
that which he has left, and fresh opportunities 
of holy service and of holy growth and blessed- 
ness are constantly set before him. He is in 
the life that he loves and ought to love, and the 
course of free and Godlike activity stretches on 
before him without end. This is the life that is 
life indeed, laid hold of on earth, but experienced 
in its fullness only in the world beyond”’ (‘‘Out- 
line of Christian Theology,”’ pp. 469-472).5 In 
this connection Dr. Clarke makes the deeply 
impressive suggestion that a large part of the 
service that mature saints will be appointed 
to render in heaven may be in the form of 
instruction and help to immature souls of 
children and perhaps others, who were unable 
to receive it on earth. He says: “Infants cannot 
grow to maturity and attain to character in any 
world without living a life of free and responsible 
action. It is a vast enrichment of our ideas of 
that world to think of innumerable youthful 
spirits as there opening for the first time to the 
knowledge and love of the Heavenly Father 


®Charles Scribner’s Sons, publishers, New York. 


90 Whai Jesus Said about Heaven 


and growing into his likeness. Moreover, if 
to so large a part of those who are with Christ 
life is necessarily educational, opportunities of 
usefulness and help must open in inexhaustible 
abundance to those who are further advanced 
in holy experience, and the heavenly life must 
be intensely active and interesting.’ The im- 
portance of this suggestion relating to the oc- 
cupations of the saints in heaven can hardly be 
overestimated. 

In addition to the elements of rest and wor- 
ship and service that enter largely into the 
heavenly life, there are strong intimations in 
certain words of Jesus. that the saints will 
exercise a kind of authority, including judicial 
functions, in the eternal world. In a previous 
chapter something was said of the dignities of 
the redeemed in glory, and this passage, among 
others, was quoted: “‘I appoint unto you a 
kingdom, ...and ye shall sit on thrones judging 
the twelve tribes of Israel’’ (Luke xxii. 29, 30). 
This was said by the Master to the apostles on 
the occasion of the Last Passover; but that the 
promise was intended to apply to all the saints 
is intimated in various other passages of the 
New Testament. For example, in Romans 
v. 17, the Apostle Paul says that “‘they that 
receive the abundance of grace and of the gift 
of righteousness shall reign in life through the - 


4 Charles Scribner’s Sons, publishers, New York. 


The Saints in Heaven: Occupation 91 


one, even Jesus Christ.’’ The same Apostle in 
his second Letter to Timothy, speaking of 
Christ, declares: “If we died with him, we 
shall also live with him; if we endure, we shall 
also reign with him” (2 Tim. ii. 11). And the 
Risen Christ is represented as saying to the 
angel of the Church in Laodicea: “‘He that 
overcometh, I will give to him to sit down with 
me in my throne, as I also overcame, and sat 
down with my Father in his throne’’ (Rev. iii. 
21). Here is implied, not honor merely, but 
also authority. One is reminded of the Parables 
of the Talents and of the Pounds, where in each 
case the master of faithful servants is said to 
have rewarded their fidelity by increasing their 
authority, making them rulers over many 
things. When we recall the fact that these 
masters were intended to represent the Divine 
Master in his dealings with his servants, the 
inference is plain and powerful, that the saints 
in heaven will in some way, of which the details 
are now to us unknown, share the functions of 
the Ruler and Judge of angels and of men. 
Such is the light which the Son of God has shed 
upon the question of the occupations of his 
saints in the future life; and with what he has 
been pleased to reveal we can well afford to 
wait until we see him “face to face.”’ 


CHAPTER XII 


THE SAINTS IN HEAVEN: 
PREPARATION 


HEN Jesus told his disciples that he was 
about to go away and prepare a place 
for them, and that he would return and receive 
them unto himself, there was no promise implied 
that heaven should be the final dwelling place of 
all men without respect to their fitness for it. 
The assurance was given to the disciples present 
at the time, and was meant to extend to all those 
who might become his true and faithful fol- 
lowers in the future. That is to say, it is no less 
essential that men should be prepared for 
heaven than that heaven should be made ready 
for men. 

This is clearly the teaching of the Master in 
the Parable of the Marriage Feast, where one of 
the king’s invited guests is represented as taking 
his place at the table without the customary 
wedding garment. When the host came in and 
saw this intruder, he asked him: ‘‘Friend, how 
camest thou in hither not having a wedding 
garment?’ The man was speechless, for he 
might have been properly clothed if he would, 
inasmuch as it was customary for the host to 
furnish his guests with festive apparel on such 

(92) 


The Saints in Heaven: Preparation 93 


occasions. He had been criminally careless, and 
thus invited the fate that overtook him; for 
the king said to his servants: ‘“‘ Bind him hand 
and foot, and cast him out into the outer dark- 
ness’’ (Matt. xxii. 11-13). In this parable the 
banquet hall represents heaven, the king is the 
Lord himself, and the speechless man is a 
type of all who present themselves as candidates 
for heavenly joys without the preparation which 
God demands, and which he enables all to ac- 
quire who earnestly wish it and who trust in 
divine help for its acquisition. It should be 
carefully noted that this demand for preparation 
is not arbitrary on the part of the Divine Host, 
but is based upon the fact that the benefits of 
heaven are restricted in the very nature of the 
case to those whose characters and tastes have 
been attuned to the conditions that prevail in 
the future abode of the saints. If it were pos- 
sible for one out of harmony in his thoughts, 
feelings, aims, and spirit with the spiritual 
society and atmosphere of heaven to penetrate 
into the very midst of it, his very disharmony 
with his surroundings would be so intolerable 
to him that he would rush forth in speechless 
confusion, to assume his true place with those 
companions whose tastes and characters were 
akin to his own. 

A vital question is, What is the nature of the 
preparation which must be made by every 


94 Whai Jesus Said about Heaven 


rational, responsible soul in order to be num- 
bered with the saints in glory everlasting? 
This inquiry finds its most authoritative answer 
in the teachings of Jesus himself. A part of this 
preparation is implied in the assurance of the 
Saviour on the cross to the dying robber at his 
side: ‘‘Verily I say unto thee, To-day shalt 
thou be with me in Paradise’’ (Luke xxiii. 43). 
There can be no doubt that this man was going 
from the cross to the companionship of Christ 
in the better world. He must have been fit 
for that world before he entered it. But he was 
evidently a rough man, probably a common 
criminal, very far from being spiritually minded 
and of exemplary character. His fitness con- 
sisted in the humble, penitent trust in divine 
mercy which he expressed in the appeal to Jesus: 
‘“Remember me when thou comest in thy king- 
dom.’’ Such a spirit denoted fitness for begin- 
ning the heavenly life, and he had all the future 
before him in which to develop in knowledge 
and holiness. 

Further light on this subject is to be found 
in the saying of Jesus: ‘“‘Blessed are the pure 
in heart; for they shall see God’’ (Matt. v. 8). 
No doubt, the vision of God includes the present 
life as a spiritual experience of those whose 
hearts are pure; but it is certainly true that it 
applies to the future life even more completely. 
To ‘‘see God”’ is a pregnant phrase implying 


The Saints in Heaven: Preparation 95 


holy fellowship with him, which is the very 
essence of heavenly bliss. In the nature of the 
case only the clean heart can perceive and enjoy 
the holy God and the pure society and atmos- 
phere of heaven. There is an echo of this beati- 
tude in the First Epistle of John (iii. 2, 3): 
“Beloved, now are we children of God, and 
it is not yet made manifest what we shall be. 
We know that, if he shall be manifested, we 
shall be like him; for we shall see him even as 
he is. And every one that hath this hope set 
on him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.” 
Even in the comparative twilight of the Old 
Testament revelation there are gleams of this 
needed fitness for association with the holy 
God, as in Psalm xxiv. 3, 4; ‘‘Who shall ascend 
into the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in 
his holy place? He that hath clean hands and 
a pure heart.’”’ In harmony with these Scrip- 
tures is the solemn admonition which the author 
of the Epistle to the Hebrews lays upon his 
brethren: ‘‘ Follow after peace with all men, and 
the sanctification without which no man shall 
see the Lord”’ (Heb. xii. 14). 

The need of preparation for heaven and 
something of the nature of it appear to be 
alluded to in certain utterances of Jesus with 
regard to laying up treasure in heaven. In 
the Sermon on the Mount he charged his hearers 
in words like these: ‘‘Lay not up for yourselves 


96 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


treasures upon the earth, where moth and rust 
consume, and where thieves break through and 
steal; but lay up for yourselves treasures in 
heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth con- 
sume, and where thieves do not break through 
nor steal; for where thy treasure is, there will 
thy heart be also’? (Matt. vi. 19-21). In 
another connection he speaks of ‘‘a treasure in 
the heavens that faileth not, where no thief 
draweth near, neither moth destroyeth’’ (Luke 
xii. 33). To the Rich Young Ruler, who pro- 
fessed to have kept the moral law and yet was 
conscious of a lack of soul satisfaction, Jesus 
said: ‘‘One thing thou lackest: go, sell whatso- 
ever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou 
shalt have treasure in heaven; and come, 
follow me’’ (Mark x. 21). This last saying 
is carefully reported by all three Synoptists, 
Matthew, Mark, and Luke, which would seem 
to indicate that it made a profound impression 
upon the disciples who heard it. 

We may not be able to know in our present 
limitations just what are the elements that 
enter into this process of laying up treasure in 
heaven; but we are safe in the conclusion that 
it embraces a life of self-denying service in 
behalf of others, coupled with generosity in 
giving to the needy from the stores with which ~ 
Providence has furnished us. This is evidently 
the teaching of Jesus in what he says of final 


The Saints in Heaven: Preparation 97 


rewards in the great Judgment scene (Matt. 
xxv). To the righteous on his right hand the 
King says: ‘‘Come, ye blessed of my Father, 
inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the 
foundation of the world: for I was hungry, and 
ye gave me meat; I was thirsty, and ye gave me 
drink; I was a stranger, and ye took me in; 
naked, and ye clothed me; I was sick, and ye 
visited me; I was in prison, and ye came unto 
me.’ When the invited ones protested in their 
bewilderment that they knew not when they 
had thus ministered to the King, he replied: 
“Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it 
unto one of these my brethren, even these least, 
ye did it unto me.” 

Of those who were commended by the King 
and invited to inherit the kingdom prepared for 
them, it is said in the closing words: ‘‘The 
righteous (shall go away) into life eternal.” 
In plain terms this means that those who have 
in this world ministered to Christ by doing 
good in his name to his brethren have thus 
become fit to enter into life eternal and abide 
with saints and angels in heaven. It is a part, 
and a chief part, of their preparation for the 
life of perfect service above. This, however, 
is not an affirmation that the key to heaven is 
found in good works alone. Far fromit. Asa 
wise writer says: ‘“‘It does not conflict with the 
doctrine that no man can enter the kingdom of 

7 


98 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


God unless he is born again; but it recognizes 
love to man as the best outward evidence of 
the new birth. It does not conflict with the 
doctrine that all men are saved by Christ; but 
it recognizes the truth that they may be saved 
by a Redeemer whose redemption they did not 
understand. But observe, that it is not the 
works, as such, which are commended, but the 
love which prompted them; that love which was 
their faith, which felt its way though in dark- 
ness to Him who is Love; and that when Christ 
is fully disclosed to them in the day of his glory, 
they will recognize him as their Lord’’ (Abbott, 
Com. on Matt.).! 

Preparation for heaven, then, according to the 
recorded teachings of Jesus, consists in humble, 
penitent trust in divine mercy, purity of the 
inner life, and that grateful love that leads to 
deeds of helpful ministration to our fellow 
creatures in imitation of the example of the 
Man of Galilee. Much more might possibly be 
said concerning fitness for the eternal home of 
the saints; but, after all, what has been here 
presented is enough to show the truth as taught 
by the Master himself. He is “the Way,” as 
well as the Truth and the Life, and his words 
are final. 


1A.S. Barnes & Company, publishers, New York. 


CHAPTER XIII 
IF YE KNOW THESE THINGS 


N our quest of the truth concerning Heaven 
we have gone to the source of knowledge and 
examined all of our Lord’s recorded utterances 
upon the subject, besides interpretative pas- 
sages in the writings of his apostles and others. 
We have thus had opportunity to ‘‘ know these 
things’’ in that degree in which it is possible for 
them to be known amid our earthly limitations. 
What are some things we have come to know? 
First of all, it is clear that, according to the 
teachings of Jesus, the present life is not all, 
but beyond it there is a Heaven for his servants 
—a blessed state of being which is probably a 
place as well asastate. Further, it is clear that 
Heaven is the abode of God the Father, that it 
is the true and permanent abode of the Saviour, 
and that the unfallen angels have their residence 
in the home which their Creator and King 
glorifies with his peculiar presence. Our study 
of the words of Jesus assures us also that Heaven 
is the appointed home of God’s saints, the true 
disciples of his Son; that the promise of the 
Master is a guarantee of its certainty and of its 
abundant rewards; that high dignities and 
honors are in store for those who share the 
(99) 


100 Whai Jesus Said about Heaven 


privations and labors of their Lord here 
below; that delightful fellowship with the 
Saviour, the unfallen angels, and the redeemed 
and glorified saints, will be the portion of all 
faithful disciples. We have seen that the ex- 
periences of the saints in heaven will include 
rest from toil and care, freedom from temptation 
and sin, deliverance from the fear of death, and 
every comfort and joy that Paradise can afford. 
Something of the occupations of the heavenly 
company we have learned also, all activities 
there being embraced in the joyous doing of the 
Father’s will. Finally, the words of Jesus make 
it plain that all who aspire to the mansions of 
the blessed in the future life must make suitable 
preparation in this world by living in the spirit 
of Heaven. 

‘“‘Tf ye know these things, happy are ye if ye 
do them,” said Jesus to his disciples, after 
washing their feet and explaining that he had 
done it to set them an example of humility 
and service. We may well give the saying a 
wider application, and realize that knowledge 
of things beyond the veil demands a course of 
conduct in harmony with the enlightenment we 
have received. Many practical suggestions 
might be made as this discussion comes to a 
close. Let a few observations suffice. 

It should increase our sense of responsibility 
to reflect that we are in possession of vital 


If Ye Know These Things 101 


knowledge beyond all the stores of wisdom 
which the ancients enjoyed. Not Plato among 
the philosophers, nor Moses the lawgiver, nor 
David the psalmist, nor Isaiah the prophet, 
ever possessed the knowledge of the future life 
that is open to us who have the words of the 
Son of God before our eyes. With this great 
accession of light there surely comes a great 
increase of responsibility. | 

While no responsibility is to be shunned and 
no duty neglected in our earthly relationships, 
we should never lose sight of the fact that “our 
citizenship is in heaven.” It is fitting that we 
should rejoice along the path of our earthly 
pilgrimage, as we remember that Jesus bade his 
disciples rejoice because their ‘‘names were 
written in heaven.’ Surely, those who are 
registered in ‘the Lamb’s Book of Life’? may 
sing with Isaac Watts: 


“Then let out songs abound, 
And every tear be dry; 
We're marching through Immanuel’s ground, 
To fairer worlds on high.” 


If Heaven lies just beyond the brief experi- 
ence that men call death, why is it fitting that a 
child of God should think of death as an enemy 
to be feared, rather than as a friend to be wel- 
comed? That which, viewed from this side, is 
the Gate of Death, is, when viewed from the 


102 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


other side, the Gate of Life. ‘‘Though I walk 
through the valley of the shadow of death, I 
will fear no evil; for thou art with me,” said 
David, who knew but little of what lay beyond. 
How much more confidently can a follower of 
Christ declare his fearless trust, when he knows 
that his Master has ‘‘abolished death, and 
brought life and immortality to light through 
the gospel.”’ 

Let no child of God be disconsolate in time of 
bereavement. If it were true that ‘‘death ends 
all,’ then indeed might thick darkness envelop 
the bereaved. But if it is true that the summons 
of death is but ‘‘the voice that Jesus sends to 
call them to his arms,’’ why should a disciple 
of Jesus join the company of mourners who sor- 
row as those who have no hope? Especially 
let no child of God charge his Father with in- 
justice or lack of sympathy when loved ones are 
taken away. If the one who has departed 
gave evidence of fitness for a better world, the 
bereaved may well find comfort in looking 
forward to a glad reunion ‘“‘some sweet day by 
and by.”’ And if, in the case of one about whose 
destiny there may be room for painful doubt, 
the heartache persists, let the departed soul be 
committed to the care of Him whose essential 
nature is love, and who is pledged to do the 
very best he can for every one whom he has 
made. The secret of peace at the open grave 


If Ye Know These Things 103 


is found in trusting our absent friends to Infinite 
Love. 

It is not amiss to recall before we close a 
solemn truth that has been spoken of already. 
If anyone aspires to the life of blessedness in 
companionship with God and his saints and 
angels, he must acquire fitness for it in this 
present life. He who would enter the Heaven of 
the future must first enter upon a life of heaven- 
ly-mindedness here below. If one is to shine 
forth as the sun in the kingdom of his Father, 
according to the saying of Jesus, it is necessary 
for him here on earth to let his light shine before 
men, that they may see his good works and 
glorify his Father in Heaven. Salvation is, 
indeed, a matter of grace; but grace is the 
instrument divinely ordained for producing 
holy character, ‘‘without which no man shall 
see the Lord.’”’ The fate of the man without a 
wedding garment must never be forgotten by 
those who aspire to welcome at the banquet of 
the King. 

“Tf ye know these things, happy are ye if ye 
do them.”’ Thrice happy will they be who use 
their heaven-sent knowledge in the cultivation 
of faith, hope, love, generosity, unselfish devo- 
tion to the will of God and the service of man- 
kind. All such will surely find a wealth of 
happiness even amid the trials and disappoint- 
ments of this mortal life. And when the final 


104 What Jesus Said about Heaven 


morning shall dawn and the shadows flee away, 
all who have cultivated heavenly-mindedness 
here below will find the transition easy and 
natural to Heaven above— 


““Where the saints of all ages in harmony meet, 
Their Saviour and brethren transported to greet; 
While the anthems of rapture unceasingly roll, 
And the smile of the Lord is the feast of the soul.” 








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